
Class JPHiT^a 



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OUT OF HARNESS" 

Sftetcbes, Narrative anD 2)cscttptivc 



By THOMAS GUTHRIE, D.D. 



J2f 



5 )0 5 ■> J , 



NEW YORK: 
E. B. TREAT & CO., 241-243 West 230 Street 

OFFICE OF 

The Treasury Magazine 



Price, $1.00. 






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CONTENTS. 



PAGB 

THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL • • • I 

NEW BRIGHTON • . . . . . • • • 22 

A WINTER GALB • • 36 

THE STREETS OF PARIS. PART L .59 

„ „ PART II .* 82 

SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM . • . I08 

•SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE : — 

I. — DR. CHALMERS AND THE COWGATE , , . I2i^ 

IL — OLD HOUSES AND OLD INSCRIPTIONS . . . I34 

III. — THE BLIND ORGANIST I49 

IV. — THE ORPHAN 167 

V. — THE CONVICT. PART 1 184 

„ ,, PART IL 201 

VI. — EVANGELISTIC EFFORTS 217 

WINTER 258 

AUTUMN •373 

THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER . . , . 292 

WATCH-NIGHT 316 

THE RECHABITES .....•••• 338 

UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. PART L . • . 36I 

^ „ PART II 374 



THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED 
SCHOOL. 

HOW IT WAS GOT UP, AND WHAT IT HAS DONE. 



DINBURGH, with the exception, perhaps, of 
some parts of Paris, is more full than any other 
town of interesting relics. Modem improve- 
ments easily clear away the brick walls that accommodate 
single families ; but massive piles of stone are not so easily 
removed. Rising six, ten, even twelve and fifteen storeys 
high, yielding large rents, and swarming with tenants, they 
long defy old time and modem taste. Built to last, if let 
alone, till the knell of doom, these old houses of Edin- 
burgh have, with few exceptions, yielded to no element 
but fire — and a mighty blaze they make ! Such acci- 
dents, however, being of rare occurrence, that long, 
lofty, rock-looking ridge, which heaves its back up from 
the Castle down to Holyrood, has much the same aspect 
that it had three hundred years ago. Since then the 
actors are gone, but the stage remains, so little changed, 

M 



2 THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

that were John Knox to rise from the dead (though 
Bishop Latimer would lose himself in modem London), 
he would feel much at home to-day in the High Street of 
Edinburgh. Recognising, as he went along, many lofty 
tenements and quaint old gables with fleur-de-lis and 
thistle, when he came near the Nether Bow he would 
find his old house not very much altered since the day 
he closed his good fight within its walls, and was carried, 
the city attending his funeral, to his grave beneath the 
shadow of St. Giles's crown. 

Like Dumbarton, Stirling, Brechin, formerly all places 
of strength, the capital of Scotland owed its existence to 
its Castle rock. That formed its nucleus. In troublous 
times people naturally sought shelter under the wings of 
such a fortalice j and when invading foes swept the open 
country, and laid happy homesteads waste with fire and 
sword, the security it afibrded, the asylum found within 
its walls, illustrate such expressions of Scripture as this, 
" The name of the Lord is a strong tower ; the righteous 
mnneth into it, and is safe." The High Street having 
begun at the Castle, and extending from it as the stem 
of a tree from its root, in that part which lies nearest the 
rock, as we might expect, its oldest and most interesting 
relics are found. There many visitors resort ; and in 
a\itumn, when the New Town is all but deserted by its 
inhabitants, and the flocks on the rocky slopes of Arthur's 
Seat or the neighbouring Pentlands might do worse than 
try a day's pasture on the grass of our fashionable 
squares, many are the groups of bearded foreigners, and 
iean AmericanSj and rotund Englishmen that are to be 



THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 3 

seen, with guide-book in hand, diving into the dark 
closes ; or spelling the black letter, or Greek, or Latin 
inscription above some low-browed door ; or gazing up 
at the lofty tenements where a foul, half-naked creature, 
with savage look, has thrust its unkempt head through a 
window from which, once on a day, fair maids of honour, 
lounging on velvet cushions, watched their gallants ride 
down the street to drive the English back across the 
border, or attend Court at Holyrood, Here, with scallop 
shell on their cloaks, lived knights who had fought for 
the Holy Sepulchre ; here, Mary of Guise, bringing the 
blood of persecution into the Stuart race, had her palace 
and held her gay Court ; here, rudely carved coronets 
mark the town houses of our oldest nobility ; here, 
" Laus Deo " on one house, " Sedes manet optima coelo " 
on another, " Praised be the Lord my God, my Strength 
and my Redeemer," on another, speak of the refor- 
mation and the piety of its times ; while here, close under- 
the Castle guns, on this broad esplanade, where loungers 
gather now to see raw recruits at the goose step, Edin- 
burgh's old burghers met to see treason punished — Lord 
Forbes lose his head. Lady Glammis burned alive, and 
traitors of meaner degree, with men and women accused 
of witchcraft, perish at the fiery stake. In a neighbour- 
hood so full of interesting associations, stands a modem 
building that disputes the public attention with the relics 
of the olden time. It is the Original Ragged School ; 
and with an open Bible (the arms of our faith) carved 
above its door, and nearly 300 children within its walls 
jyhorn ChrJstia,n charitj has rescued from ruin, it form^ 

3 2 



4 THX EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOI. 

the most interesting object there to many. Leaving an- 
tiquarians to their dusty and dry researches, many have 
entered our school, saying, with Moses, " I will turn 
aside, and see this great sight ; " and after visiting Palace, 
Castle, and the crowd of interesting objects of " mine 
own romantic town," they have left our Institution, pro- 
nouncing it the best sight in Edinburgh. I proceed to 
relate its history, its rise, its progress, and its success ; in 
all which, the hand of Providence has so often appeared, 
that we may surely say of it, " This is the Lord's doing ; 
it is marvellous in our eyes." 

Holland is the only country that appears at the period 
of the Reformation to have anticipated an increase of 
population, — ^and provided for it. There the State enacted 
that whenever a parish added two thousand to its inhabi- 
tants, it should have an additional minister. But in 
Scotland there never was any such provision ; such wise 
adaptation of Church and schools to the growth of the 
nation, as men might have been taught by God's works in 
nature, where the integument that covers our body 
stretches with their expansion, and trees shed their bark, 
and the serpent wriggles out of its old skin, and the 
crab throws off, like an ill-fitting coat, its last year's shell 
for one suited to a twelvemonth's growth. For instance, 
St. Cuthbert's or the West Church, once a country parish, 
lying on the skirts of Edinburgh, came to have the town 
extended into its fields till its population rose to 60,000 
souls, — but never another church rose there. It was left 
with its one parish church, as if the petticoats of a child 
were fit clothing for a man. In this way, and in the 



THB EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 5 

course of time, chiefly, indeed, in the last century — for 
Scotland never fairly started in the race of progress till 
the last hope of the Jacobites was quenched in blood on 
Drummossie Moor — the population of our towns shot far 
ahead of the means of education and of religious instruc- 
tion. There were no " children of Issachar which were 
men that had understanding of the times, to know what 
Israel ought to do." 

Another cause which largely contributed to the igno- 
rance and irreligion that now pervade the lowest strata of 
our cities is found in the blight under which so many of 
the churches withered, and some of them all but died, in 
the last half of the eighteenth century. How low the 
state of morals and religion, even among the ministers of 
the gospel, revealed in the autobiography of Dr. Carlyle 
of Musselburgh ! Think of that poor old man, on the 
verge of his grave, boasting how he had stemmed the tide 
of fanaticism, and crushed the bigotry which took offence 
at ministers being play-goers ! It appears from his Me- 
moirs that the leading clergy of Edinburgh were in the 
habit of spending their evenings at taverns, in the society 
of leading infidels j there men that professed to preach 
Christ, cracked their jokes and drank their claret with 
men who openly denied the Saviour, and gloried in their 
infidelity. " I," said the Psalmist, " am a companion to 
all them that fear thee j " but in David Hume and Adam 
Smith the leading clergy had their bosom friends. So 
low, indeed, had the standard, not of religion, but of 
clerical decorum sunk, that the business of the General 
Assembly was arranged so as to allow the ministers during 



6 THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL, 

its sittings to spend their evenings in the theatre. So 
says Dr. Carlyle. He was behind the scenes, and knew 
all about it. And thus, in a court, constituted in the 
name of our Lord Jesus Christ, opened with prayer, 
dealing with the most solemn matters, these divines hur- 
ried through their business to be in time for the Play, — 
for the Farce at least ; seeking compensation for the 
dreary dulness of the forenoon's work in hearty laughter 
over The Merry Wives of Windsor. This was very 
shocking ; nor are we less shocked to read how one, who 
professed high orthodoxy, dared to boast of the number 
of bottles of claret he could carry under his bdt. How 
could this have ended but in the utter ruin of religion, in 
the loss of all that our godly fathers had suffered, fought, 
and died to attain, unless, in answer to the prayers of a 
few who sighed and cried over the abominations of the 
land, God had returned to visit the vine his own right 
hand had planted, and that the boar out of the field had 
wasted. 

This race of clergy is now extinct, like those monstrous 
animals which belonged to a former epoch, — and from 
whose ravages the world is happily delivered. But they 
have left more than their foot-prints behind them. The 
mischief they did remains. To meet the wants of a 
growing population, the State did nothing for education ; 
the Church did less than nothing for religion ; and we 
have to reap the consequence of this neglect and apathy. 
They stand up there in thousands and tens of thousands, 
in our large towns who fear neither God, nor man ; who 
go neither to Church, nor chapel ; who respect neither 



THK EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. ^ 

Sabbath, nor saint's day ; who neither can educate their 
children, nor care to educate them : who Hve in the most 
abject poverty, and indulge in the most shocking vices ; 
whose foul houses, hungry faces, and filthy rags are 
dreadfiil to look on in God's creatures ; and who die as 
insensible to the future as the beasts that have no future, 
and dying, perish. 

This is a fair description of the great mass of the 
people among whom I was called to labour, as one of 
the ministers of the Old GreyfHars' parish. It was there 
that, many long years ago, I got my first glimpse of the 
rude, ignorant, and savage state of the children that 
always swarm thickest where the people are poorest. 
A student at College, I accompanied a fHend to a 
Sabbath-school, which to accommodate an acquaint- 
ance he had undertaken to teach for that night The 
room was large and dingy, dimly lighted with candles — 
there being no gas in those days. The door opened on 
such a set of ragamuffins as I had never seen before j 
whooping, whistling, yelling, singing. By entreaties, and 
dint of perseverance, some order was at length estab- 
lished, and a psalm given out to sing. No Orpheus to 
charm these unruly spirits, my friend who could not sing, 
would sing ; and his cracked voice and nasal twang was 
the signal for such an uproar ! Poor fellow ! he was 
very good and patient ; he held on his way till he got to 
the end of the singing, and calling them to join in 
prayer, unfortunately closed his eyes. For a moment his 
reverent attitude, and the voice of prayer, seemed, like 
the voice of Jesus on the stormy waters, to produce a 



8 THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

great calm. But by-and-by I heard a curious noise, and 
shall not forget the sight which met my eyes on sud- 
denly opening them ; there — and behind them a crowd 
of grinning faces, red with efforts to suppress their 
laughter — stood two ragged urchins, each holding a 
flaming candle under my friend's nose, and I could not 
help thinking that there was a wicked cleverness in this ; 
for it so happened that this feature of his face always, 
and especially on that winter night, looked very cold. 

Then I wondered at the wickedness and rudeness of 
these boys, but I had not been three weeks ministering 
in the College Wynd and Cowgate, when I saw what 
accounted for it ; and wonder was changed to pity. Of 
the first 150 I visited in the Old Greyfriars' parish, going 
from door to door, certainly not more than five attended 
any place of worship. I wandered in those houses for 
whole days without ever seeing a Bible, or indeed any 
book at all. I often stood in rooms bare of any furni- 
ture ; where father, mother, and half a dozen children 
had neither bed nor bedding, unless a heap of straw and 
dirty rags huddled in a corner could be called so. I 
have heard the wail of children crying for bread, and 
their mother had none to give them. I have seen the 
babe pulling breasts as dry as if the starved-looking 
mother had been dead. I have known a father turn his 
step-daughter to the street at night — bidding the sobbing 
girl who bloomed into womanhood, earn her bread there 
as others were doing. I have bent over the foul pallet 
of a dying lad to hear him whisper how his father and 
mother — who were sitting half drunk by the fireside— 



THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 9 

had pulled the blankets off his body to sell them for 
drink. I have seen children blanched like plants grow- 
ing in a cellar — for weeks they never breathed a mouthful 
of fresh air for want of rags to cover their nakedness ; 
and I used often to observe in these dingy dwellings, 
where the air is poison, and the food is scanty, and the 
cold is bitter, and short is the gleam of sunshine, and 
they live in continual terror of a drunken father or 
mother, and where when they cry they are not kissed but 
beaten, that the children have an air of sadness, and look 
as if they never smiled. I don't recollect of ever seeing 
a mother in these wretched dwellings dandling her infant, 
or of hearing the little creature crow or laugh as he leapt 
with joy. There, infants have no toys; and mothers' 
smiles are rare as sunshine. Nobody can know the 
misery I suffered amid those scenes of human wretched- 
ness, woe, want, and sin. 

But the misery into which I had plunged was not, 
thank God ! suffered in vain. They say, a prophet is 
prepared in a fiery furnace ; and these years of suffering 
prepared me to do such service as I have rendered to the 
Ragged School cause. I became acquainted with the 
condition of the poorest of the poor ; and learned to 
pity, much more than to blame them. I was taught, by 
many bitter disappointments, and profitless efforts to 
change the adults, that, though nothing is impossible 
with God, the best hope of raising the sunken masses lay 
in working on the rising generation ; and I was brought 
to the conclusion, that unless the yawning gulf which 
separates these children from education is bridged over 



lO THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

n<. ^iiiM^— ^ « ■■■ ■■■■ ■ ii H .■■■■■■■ » " 

by a loaf of bread — unless, in other words, they are fed 
as well as educated at school — they must remain beg- 
ging, or stealing, or starving ; to sink, if that is possible, 
into deeper depths of ignorance and crime. 

In 1 84 1, Sheriff Watson had set up a Ragged School 
in Aberdeen ; and not very long afterwards an oppor- 
tunity, though not of my seeking, occurred of repeating 
his experiment in Edinburgh. The congregation of Free 
St John's, after building their church, found themselves 
in possession of a large room in its under-ground story. 
We had to consider to what good purpose it could be 
turned. It was proposed by some to open a Free 
Church school there. To this I and others objected, on 
the ground that there was already an adequate number 
of common schools in the neighbourhood ; and that a 
school below our church could only be filled at the ex- 
pense of these, and to the injury of their teachers. The 
neighbourhood swarmed with hundreds of ragged chil- 
dren who — obliged to steal, or beg their food, or starve 
— ^neither went, nor could go, to any common school ; 
and with the view of saving a few of these, I proposed 
that the congregation should set up and maintain a 
ragged, feeding, industrial school, for some twenty or 
thirty waifs. The proposal was agreed to ; and orders 
were given for the necessary apparatus of soup-boiler and 
porridge-pot. But thf morning came; and schemes 
sometimes, as well as spangles, look different in day 
from what they do in gas or candlelight. Some of our 
office-bearers got, and not very unnaturally, alarmed at the 
responsibilities we were about to incur; and in conse- 



THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. If 

quence the attempt was abandoned. But the hope of 
saving poor creatures from the wreck was too dear, and 
had been too nearly realised to be abandoned without a 
further struggle. Baffled in this direction another lay 
open to me. I might leave the limits of St. John's con- 
gregation, and of the Free Church, to launch out on the 
open sea ; I might throw myself on the Christian public, 
irrespective of sect or party ; for were these children 
saved, it was nothing to me to what church they might 
attach themselves, or whose arm plucked them from de- 
struction. Having undertaken to come forward with 
70/. for supporting a Ragged School under our chiurch, 
and not having 70/. nor 7/. to spare, I had, with the view 
of appealing to friends for aid, laid down the keel of my 
First Plea. Let no man think poverty an unmitigated 
evil j for if I had been able to spare 70/., I had never 
projected a Plea, nor run the risk of being crushed in the 
Press. And let no man lose heart, and abandon a good 
scheme because he meets chopping seas and cross winds 
at the outset, since God may be thereby driving him on 
a better course, and toward greater ends than he ever 
dreamt of. On my little pet scheme being abandoned, I 
said, in the bitterness of my heart, " All these things are 
against me ; " but God, who had planned a much greater 
and more catholic enterprise, was saying, " My ways are 
not as your ways j and my thoughts are not as your 
thoughts.*' 

The Plea was at length prepared and published. It 
fell on Edinburgh as falls a spark into a powder maga- 
zine. The public mind had been prepared for the 



13 THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

scheme ; and, like a great mountain stone, which rains 
and melting snows had been silently undermining for 
years, it only needed a push to set the mass in motion. 
Leaving him that moved it to wonder at the effect, away 
it went — taking grand, joyful bounds, and bearing all 
before it. All men were ready to sing over the birth of 
this Christian enterprise. They hailed the proposal to 
establish it on a broad, unsectarian basis. The judges 
of the land, who had long mourned in secret over the 
practical injustice of the law, and public prosecutors who 
had reluctantly placed infants at the bar, and asked for 
sentence on creatures more fit to be pitied than punished, 
were among the foremost with offers of support ; all sec- 
tarian feelings were engulfed in a flowing tide of common 
love and pity ; and money poured in on us in shoals of 
letters, some bearing the stamp of coronets, and some 
the stamp of thimbles. 

At length our schools were opened with an attendance 
of two score boys and girls ; and, as these were broken 
in, we increased the number. They all received three 
good meals ; they came to school before breakfast, and 
left it after supper ; they went through daily ablutions : 
they were trained so many hours to work, and led out so 
many to walk ; they were taught to read, write, and 
cypher ; they received religious instruction — reading, 
and being examined on the Bible. Our superintendent, 
Mr. Gibb, soon won their affections, and was himself a 
prince of teachers. Our Committee of Management, 
consisting of Episcopalians and Established Church- 
men, United Presbyterians and Free Churchmen, 



THK EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED ICHOOL. I3 

Baptists and Independents, worked together in happy 
harmony; and for a while we had fulfilled to us the 
beautiful prayer of an Indian chief, " May your council 
fire never go out, and may your sky be without a cloud." 
The cloud came at length, and brought a storm. It hap- 
pened thus. Nearly half of the wretched outcasts whom 
we had gathered into the school, and were saving from a 
life of crime and misery, were the children of nominal 
Roman Catholics. Some of these had no parents ; and 
those who had, belonged to a class of Papists that had 
sunk like too many of their nominally Protestant neigh- 
bours into practical heathenism. These children, all 
foul and ragged, were taught to beg and steal, or left to 
starve ; nor until we made an effort to save them, had 
either prelate or priest done else than leave them to their 
fate — passing by on the other side. I never, indeed, 
literally saw a priest pass by on the other side, ior, 
though my almost daily walk, some twenty years ago, 
was in the Cowgate, I never saw a priest there at all. 
They might have had other duties to do than to go forth 
hke the good shepherd after their lost sheep. But so it 
was. The girls were left to grow up prostitutes, and 
the boys to become thieves. So soon, however, as these 
poor children were gathered into our school, and taught 
to read God's blessed Word, Popery rose to rescue them 
from so great a danger. Father Keenan of Dundee was 
careless enough to show the cloven foot. He in effect 
boldly stated that he would prefer to see the children 
perish in the streets rather than get food and education 
and God's Word in the Dundee Ragged Schools : " For 



14 THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

Heaven's sake," exclaimed this zealot, as if he could be 
ignorant that these creatures had no faith, and grew up 
polluted from their earliest years, "let them, spotless 
and with unshaken faith, perish to the world, rather than 
live in abundance, purchased at such risk, and perish 
eternally ! " In Edinburgh, the tools of Rome, keeping 
behind the scenes, acted with more caution, shrewdly 
guessing that grand speeches from the lips of Popish 
priests, on behalf of toleration and religious liberty, would 
sound queer to those who had read of the fires of Smith- 
field and St. Andrew's, of the tortures of the Inquisition, 
and the bloody massacre of St. Bartholomew. 

I have no wish to rake up the ashes of an old contro- 
versy ; and since most of those with whom we had to 
fight are in their graves, it would be unseemly to exult 
over their defeat. Requiescat in pace. We insisted that 
every child in our school should read and be instructed 
daily in the Word of God, without asking the priest's 
leave — whether he would or would not. We held that to 
be the really sectarian school that excludes the Bible 
from all or any ; even as the Popish is really the sec- 
tarian decalogue, since it exclues the Second Command- 
ment — and to make up the ten, splits the tenth into two. 
The gentleman who headed the opposition was incautious 
enough to state in his speech, as I heard with my own 
ears, and an astonished public heard with theirs, and the 
newspapers reported — although the statement was omitted 
in his revised speech — that when in Ireland he had been 
told by Roman Catholics themselves, " that for a con- 
sideration they would rather be guilty of shooting a man, 



THB EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOI« I5 

than of eating flesh on Friday ; " and the thrill of horror 
with which this was heard, proved that the citizens of 
Edinburgh would never consent to have the children they 
had adopted served with such *' serpent " food. We held 
that in a Ragged School, whatever might be the case in 
other schools, the object aimed at could not be accom- 
plished without the pure milk of God's Word for these 
babes, and that the principle — although some good men 
among our opponents seemed to have lost sight of it in 
the dust of battle — was the irreconcilable and eternal 
difference between Protestantism and Popery ; the prin- 
ciple that God has addressed His Word to all the human 
family. We held firmly to this, that its free use is as 
much man's heaven-bestowed right, as the free use of 
God's air and sun. Holding that no party, whether 
priest or presbyter, has any right to interfere between a 
parent and child, and holding also, that in having 
adopted these children whom we clothed, fed, and edu- 
cated, we were placed to them in loco parentis — in the 
position of parents — we felt as much bound to instruct 
them as to instruct our own children in the saving truths 
of the Gospel. We had entered on the solemn respon- 
sibility of being their " keepers ; " and there Hes the plain 
difference between the position of the directors of a 
Ragged School, and that of the patrons or managers of 
ordinary schools. Well, the dispute between us and 
those, who, some of them not intending it, fought tor 
Popish intolerance, was referred on their motion to the 
decision of an Edinburgh public. The city was stirred 
to its depths : the Music Hall was filled to overflowing ; 



W$ THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

and, after a fair stand-up fight for four hours before the 
leading men of Edinburgh on the platform, and a mag- 
nificent audience in the area and gallery of the house, 
the question was put to the vote. I have seen nothing 
more glorious than the forest of hands that rose up to 
approve our principles, and few things so ludicrous as 
the five hands raised on the other side — a feeling which 
they indeed seemed to share to whom the hands be- 
longed ; for, greeted with a peal of laughter, the hands 
went down like a duck in the water at the shot of a gun. 
There was great joy that day in Edinburgh ; and many 
who, like Eli, had been trembling for the Ark of God, 
when they saw us come back, with colours flying, from 
the field of a most important victory, gave thanks to 
Him to whom we sung, "Blessed be the Lord my 
strength, which teacheth my hands to war, and my 
fingers to fight." 

Relieved from the presence of those between whom 
and us there could be no concord, our course since has 
been one of unbroken harmony and marvellous success. 

The wretched condition of the children to whom our 
school has opened its arms, is set forth in the following 
table, taken from one of our early Reports : — 

Found homeless, and provided with lodgings • . 72 

Children with both parents 32 

With the father dead 140 

Mother dead 89 

Deserted by parents ...... 43 

With one or both parents transported. • . • 9 

Fatherless, with drunken mother* • • • • 77 

Motherless, with drvmken fathen • • • • $6 



THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 17 



With both parents worthless 84 

Who have been beggars ayi 

Who have been in the Police Office. ... 75 

Who have been in Prison • 20 

Known as children of thieves 76 

Believed to be so, including the preceding . . , 148 



What is this but a modem edition of the prophet's 
roll, written within and without, with " lamentation, and 
mourning, and woe ? " 

The results of our School are to be found in many- 
happy homes, the abodes of those that, once wretched, 
ragged outcasts, are now honest men and virtuous 
mothers, useful citizens and heads of families ; and we 
have good reason to believe that some whom we picked 
from the dust-heap, plucked from the very gutter, are 
now shining in heaven, gems in a Saviour's crown. But 
so far as the results a*^ very palpable matters of fact, 
they may be summed up under these three heads : — 

I. We — and in these results I include the influence of 
other, though smaller schools — have cleared the streets 
of Edinburgh of juvenile beggars, — a feat the Magistrates 
and Police, with cells and prison at their back, were so 
far from ever being able to achieve, that, when our School 
was set on foot, their name was Legion. They swarmed 
through all the town — ^it was creeping with them. 

II. We are fast emptying the prisons. If, as they say, 
" seeing is believing," look at the following tables : — 

" Our school was opened in the summer of 1847, ^^^ 
could not, of course, tell much on the returns of that 
year. 

9 



l8 THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

In 1847 the centesimal proportion of children under 14 

years of age in prison was . . . .5*^ 

i«48 3.7 

1849 2.9 

1850 1.3 

1851 9 

1858 1.7 

1859 1.2 

** There has been also a remarkable decrease in the 
commitments of prisoners from fourteen to sixteen years 
of age. 

The numher of prisoners between 14 and 16 years of 
age was, in 

1848 552 

1849 440 

1850 361 

1851 . , 227 

1058 ■••«••■•■ 138 

1859 130" 

I have it from gentlemen, members of Prison Boards, 
that the most remarkable feature of our time is the 
steady and even rapid decrease of crime — a most grati- 
fying circumstance, and one which those most competent 
to judge attribute chiefly to the influence of Ragged and 
Reformatory Schools. A part of our gaols will by-and-by 
be to let; and already our gaolers are suffering from 
tnnui. A gentleman in an official position told me the 
other day, that a large gaol in the west of Scotland 
having been found too large for the common class of 
prisoners, a part of it had been appropriated to convicts ; 
and having some of that class to find room for, he went 
|o this gaol to see whether they could be accommodated 



THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 1 9 

there. He knocked — the grim door opened — and a very 
dull, sad, and gruesome-looking man appeared. On my 
acquaintance telling who he was, and what he called for, 
the countenance of the gaoler instantly lighted up, as 
when one lets on the full stream of gas, — he was so 
happy at the prospect of getting something to do — of 
getting idle time off his hands. 

III. The Original Ragged School alone has rescued 
from great misery and certain ruin not less than five 
hundred children. They are now blessings to society. 
This number does not include the many who have re- 
ceived at our school a partial education, nor that con- 
siderable number whose parents, finding their circum- 
stances improved, have removed them from ours to 
higher schools. I have heard statistics of Ragged Schools 
of the couleur-de-rose kind. They were too good to be 
true j and a cause which needs not the help of exaggera- 
tion is only damaged by such displays of imposition 
or credulity. The statistics I give may be thoroughly 
trusted. Now, of those five hundred children, who are, 
take them all in all, playing their part well in life, let us 
suppose that but one -half had run a career in crime. 
That is a very low supposition, but take it. Since every 
criminal costs the country on an average 300/., the State, 
before it has done with punishing them, would have 
incurred an expense of 75,000/. What have we saved 
the public purse by saving these children ? Our school, 
during its twelve years' existence, has been maintained 
at an outlay of some 24,000/. Sinking, therefore, all 
considerations of a humane, mofalj and reli^ous kind, 

ca 



aO THE EDINBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 

and looking only to the pounds, shillings, and pence 
view of the case, we have saved the country a sum equal 
to the difference between 24,000/. and 75,000/., which is 
51,000/ And if we make the much more probable sup- 
position, that but for our school — its useful, kind, and 
holy training — two-thirds of those five hundred children 
would have developed into full-blown criminals, we have 
saved the country not less than 72,000/ 

It is strange and sad that I should have to charge our 
Government with a niggardly treatment of schools they 
should have fostered, patronized, and liberally supported 
as one of the most holy and blessed remedies for evils 
that it baffled the whole power of the State to cure. 
What it could not do with its gallows, its prisons, its 
police, and penal settlements, we have done. The light 
of education, the knowledge of the Gospel, the kindness 
of Christian hands, and the love of Christian hearts, have 
conquered those that defied the boasted terrors of the 
law. The devil-possessed whom chains could not bind 
is there — sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed, and in his 
right mind. One would think that those who saved the 
lost, and helped the neediest, would have shared most 
largely of the funds the country puts into the hands of 
the Privy Council for promoting the interests of educa- 
tion. But, strange to say, the rule of the Government 
seems to be, to give much to educate those that need 
little help, and little to educate those who need much. 
A sum of 1,200,000/ is voted by Parliament for the pur- 
poses of education ; and while hundreds of thousands go 
to educate children whose parents are in circumstances 



THE EDl.VBURGH ORIGINAL RAGGED SCHOOL. 21 

to give them a fa'r education at their own expense, all 
the help we receive is half a farthing per day for each 
child we save from a life of misery and crime. Mockery, 
and miserable economy ! Surely a Christian country will 
rise to remonstrate against the State — to use the words 
of Lord Brougham — abdicating one of its most important 
duties. Our employment is eminently like His who 
came to seek and to save the lost ; and who put into the 
mouth of the prodigal's father, words bO descriptive of 
these reclaimed outcasts, " This my son that was dead is 
alive again, that was lost is found.'* Governments may 
turn a deaf ear to our petitions \ though, when we have 
burst the bands of red tape, and breaking tnrough the 
outer circle of mere officials, have got our case fairly set 
before them, I hope better things of men in power. 
Meanwhile let the prayers and liberality of all baptized 
into the spirit of Jesus support us ; this be the picture of 
their life : — 

** I live for those that love me, 
For those that know me true, 
For the heaven that smiles above mCy 
And waits my coming too, 

•* For the cause that lacks assistance, 
For the wrongs that need resistand^ 
For the future in the distance. 
For the good th&t I can da*^ 




NEW BRIGHTON. 

N ill-humour with our Government for declining 
his master's invitation to the European Con- 
gress, Emile Girardin has charged our country 
with the " fury and perfidy of the sea." We rose from 
reading this hbel to take a forenoon saunter along the sands 
of New Brighton. The ocean lay before us wrapped in a 
gray haze, quiet as a mill pond, its wavelets hardly stirring 
the few empty shells on the beach, making Girardin's de- 
scription appear as inappropriate as its application was ill- 
natured. Not many hours thereafter, and we acknow- 
ledged him to be, though not a historian, a poet — the sea 
was foaming, mad with rage, and leaping on the land as if 
it would swallow it up ; while gallant ships, beguiled out 
of port by its placid face, were perishing on thundering 
lee-shores, reefs, and sunken sand-banks. 

New Brighton, where we sojourned during this tre- 
mendous gale — of which more anon — lies at the mouth 
of the Mersey, whence the shore trends westward to the 
sands sung of by Kingsley in " Call the cattle home," 
and onward to where the great Ormes Head looks down 



NEW BRIGHTON. 23 



on Beaumaris' beautiful bay. The town is a distant 
suburb of Liverpool. Rising from the beach, it spreads 
itself over some high grounds which, though wearing a 
thick coat of sand, appear to rest on the ridge of soft red 
rock that forms a neighbouring, low, bluff headland, 
called the Red Noses. With a vulgar name this head- 
land is rather picturesque — the sea having carved it with 
fretwork, and hollowed its front with caves. It is not, 
however, to any resemblance which these bear to nostrils 
that it owes a name more suggestive of stronger liquids 
than water — fresh or salt. Untutored man clothes 
common thoughts in lively metaphors, his own body sup- 
plying not a few of them. Hence, retaining the imagi- 
native language of old times, we speak of the brow of a 
cliff, the foot of a mountain, the breast of a hill, the 
mouth of a river, and the arms of the sea. Hence also 
probably the use of the name of that feature, which, 
though giving much of its character, and beauty also, to 
the countenance, no poet with the exception of Solomon 
has ventured to sing. Discovering a resemblance to it 
in those parts of the land which project themselves 
sharply out into the sea, our fathers called them Noses 
•—an expression still recognisable in the names of Sheer- 
ness, Stromness, and many other coast places between 
Orkney and the Land's End. 

The shore here stretches a long way westward, forming 
an admirable promenade for foot or horseback exercise. 
It is faced with no bank of pebbles to give out the music 
when the wave, having spent its fury on the shore, sucks 
back the rattling shingle ; and it has few shells, beyond 



NEW BRIGHTON. 



those furnished by a mussel bed, which rises at ebb-tide 
above the water, and looks like a long, low, black reef. 
Adorned with sea anemones, it reminds one of the 
words of Southey : — 

** Here, too, were living flowers, 
Which, like a bud compacted. 
Their purple heads contracted. 
And now, in open blossoms spread, 
Stretch'd, like green anthers, many a seeking head." 

They are squatted in great numbers on this bank, and 
hold joyous revel on the mussels. Repulsive as they 
look when closed up, and covered with sand and mud, it 
is said that these polypes, " boiled in sea-water, acquire a 
firm and palatable consistence," making a dish fit for an 
epicure. The Italians eat them ; so might the natives oi 
Normandy, who luxuriate on snail soup, and so — but for 
our prejudices — might we, who devour live oysters. 

Seaward of New Brighton lie formidable sand-banks, 
over which the waves often run in tremendous breakers 
They are the grave of many a poor sailor, and at the 
moment of writing this, amid the rattle of windows and 
the roar of wind and waters, the keepers of our light- 
house are signalling Liverpool that two vessels are 
aground on them ; and we wait anxiously for tugs and 
Hfe-boats to come, hasting to the rescue. This shore, as 
there are no reefs on the coast, presents few of the sea- 
weeds which give so much interest to many other shores, 
and form those submarine forests on which, lying over 
the side of our boat on a sunny day, we have never 
wearied looking, as we watched their graceful waving in 



NEW BRIGHTON. ^5 



the gentle swell, and the many beautiful, with some odd- 
looking, creatures that swam or crawled among them. 
Almost the only things like seaweeds are not seaweedi, 
but a variety of marine zoophytes ; each in its form and 
symmetrical arrangement rivalling the most graceful pro- 
ductions of the vegetable world. One of these, a Ser< 
tularia^ appears under the microscope as a branched 
stalk, set on each side with cup-like processes. Each 
cup holds a living creature, which, by protruding a row 
of ciliae or fringed-like processes from its circular mouth, 
causes a rotatory motion in the water, and thus draws in 
the animalculae which are its daily bread. The whole 
stem, which is fixed to rock, or shell, or seaweed, goes 
by the name of a Polypidom, or house of Polyps. One 
house in my old parish in Edinburgh, No. 8, Cowgate 
Head, swarmed with a hundred inhabitants, but some of 
these Polypidoms count theirs by thousands and tens of 
thousands. Though perhaps sometimes "out of har- 
ness," they are never out of house. The benefits as well 
as pleasures of travelling are unknown to them ; though 
near neighbours, they are not neighbourly ; . and, never 
leaving their own narrow sphere to expatiate in the broad 
sea, these polyps get, no doubt, very contracted in their 
views, and may be regarded as types of those men and 
women who, placed, or placing themselves, in similar cir- 
cumstances, are bigots — seeing nothing to commend, 
nothing to imitate, outside their own Church, coimtry, or 
party. These creatures are allied to those which form 
the coral of ladies' ornaments and babies' rattles. They 
are polyps also, and build those abodes of theirs we call 



26 NEW BRIGHTON. 



coral, of the lime which the water holds in solution, and 
which they have the power of extracting. Exceedingly 
interesting objects under the microscope, they fill even 
the naked eye with wonder and delight. A ship — .12^9 
low, black, smoking steamer — ^but a three-master, with 
her fine lines and tall tapering spars, and a cloud of 
snow-white canvas, spread out to the sunshine, ploughing 
the waves, and throwing them in sheets of foam from her 
bows, is perhaps of all man's works the most imposing ; 
the most beautiful triumph of his art. In her we walk 
the waters, and ride on the wind ; yet what a poor inven- 
tion compared with the lowest creature of God's hand in 
the blue depths below her keel ! Wrecked, crushed, 
torn, dead on the beach, they are beautiful even in 
death, and recall to thoughtful minds such words as 
these : — " O Lord, how manifold are Thy works, in 
wisdom hast thou made them all ; the earth is full of 
Thy riches. So is this great and wide sea, where are 
things creeping innumerable, both small and great beasts. 
There go the ships ; there is that Leviathan whom thou 
hast made to play therein. These wait all upon Thee ; 
that thou mayest give them their meat in due season." 

Grand words these ! Surely philosophers, if they 
would not expose science to suspicion, and themseJves 
to the contempt of even vulgar minds, should leave it to 
the fool to say, " There is no God ! " 

Among other objects of interest, this beach has one 
which is at once a convenience to the inhabitants, and a 
great curiosity to visitors. There are fresh-water springs, 
which rise out at sea off the coast of America. Probably 



NEW BRIGHTON. 27 



supplied from internal reservoirs in the Andes, they gush 
up in such volume, and with such force, as to burst the 
foundations of the great deep, and form a fountain of 
fresh v;rater in the midst of a salt sea — as much to the 
comfort of ships which, it is said, sometimes water there, 
as to the discomfort of fish, that, living in pickle, must 
wonder, on getting into these sweet waters, where they 
are. Nearer home, the Bass Rock — a place interesting, 
politically, as the last spot of British ground which stood 
up in 1688 for the House of Stuart, and no less interest- 
ing, ecclesiastically, to Scotchmen at least, as the Patmos, 
in whose dungeons the Covenanters were immured — ^has 
a spring of fresh water near its summit. This surprised 
us more than the myriads of Solan geese that whiten its 
dark crags, and, bold as free, show fight when you 
approach their nests. One little looks for such a thing 
on a mass of basalt that lies about four miles out at sea, 
and has been shot up by volcanic fires some hundred 
feet above the billows which go roaring through its caves. 
It, no doubt, owes this strange firesh-water spring to 
some connection with the Pentland or Lammermoor hills. 
Cloud condensers these, they thus, in a type of heavenly 
blessings, ministered to the good, brave men to whom — 
certain modern detractors and caricaturists, who kick at 
the dead lion, notwithstanding — our country owes her 
noblest rights — rights sought from God in their prayers, 
and bought with their blood. Now the sands of New 
Brighton boast a spring which, as a natural curiosity, 
rivals that on the Bass. It rises among the salt sea sand. 
It is buried twice a day below the waves ; yet its water 



2S NEW BRIGHTON. 



is fresh and sweet as that which shepherds drink at a 
mountain mossy well. Soon after the tide has retired, 
this curious spring clears itself of all brackishness — image 
of the grace which, rising in a Christian's heart, " a well 
of water springing up into everlasting life," casts out im- 
purities. It is called the Widow's Well; and thereby 
hangs a tale of English kindness : — 

A gentleman, taking pity on a woman who had been 
left destitute by the death of her husband, turned the 
spring into her means of living — teaching us that if there 
is a will to do kindnesses, a way will be found. He 
cleared the spring of sand ; sank a barrel, with its head 
and bottom knocked out, over it; and installed the 
widow there with table and glasses to supply the visitors 
and earn their douceurs. So, since this barrel did not 
waste, he made it, in a way, as good to her as was, to 
another widow, that of which it is written that "the 
barrel of meal wasted not, neither did the cruse of oil 
fail, according to the word of the Lord, which he spake 
by Elijah." In making provision for widows, I have 
regretted to see that people are not always so wise in 
England. Tap-rooms and beer-shops, which fill the pages 
of its provincial newspapers with loathsome details of 
crime, are places over which " lone women " are surely 
unfit to preside ; and the number of widows, south the 
border, licensed to keep these " drunkeries " has always 
appeared to me more creditable to English sympathy 
than EngHsh sense. 

Of that water " of which if a man drink he shall never 
thirst,*' New Brighton suffers no lack ; but enjoys, on the 



NEW BRIGHTON. 29 



<ontrary, a full and very admirable supply. We have 
tried all the wells ; worshipping in the Episcopalian, Con- 
gregational, and Wesleyan Churches. Nor, though un- 
accustomed to instrumental music in church, was our 
enjoyment of the services disturbed by the organs of the 
two first, or the modest harmonium of the last. Being 
placed in a pew which commanded a partial sight of the 
organ-blower, and of his head and shoulders going up 
and down at every blast of the bellows, like the piston of 
a steam-engine, I was only disturbed by my sympathy 
for this official. While others were singing, I fancied he 
must be groaning; and could not but wish that in all 
churches, as in some, where an organ is used, the power 
of steam, or water, was employed to supply wind to the 
pipes. 

Among the Methodists we had the opportunity of 
hearing their " local preachers," as they are called. 
This is a class to which all their ministers must at one 
time have belonged. Nor are any recognised as "locals" 
till they have proved themselves, by a twelvemonths' 
trial, able to address men in a way both interesting and 
instructive — ^which was just what the Scotch woman pro- 
nounced wanting in a poor preacher of whom she said 
that he was neither " edifyin nor divertin." It is after a 
young man has gone through this ordeal that he goes 
into regular training for the ministry, and not till then. 
Now, whatever objections may lie to the plan in respect 
of its details, the idea appears a sound one. As a recruit 
is not admitted into the army, and sent to drill, till it has 
been ascertained that he possesses the physical properties 



NEW BRIGHTON. 



which fit him to be an efficient soldier, so, by the applica- 
tion of an adequate test, the churches should try whether- 
men possess those properties and powers which will make 
them efficient preachers, before they are put into regular 
training for the ministry. The timely application of such 
a test would go far to protect congregations from ineffi- 
cient preachers ; and also save men the pain of discover- 
ing, when too late, that they have mistaken their profes- 
sion — a mistake well described by a shrewd countryman,, 
who, talking to me of his minister, said, — that when he 
left the plough for the Church, the parish lost the best 
ploughman, and got the worst minister, it ever had. 

Queer stories are told of these "locals" — how they 
violate the rules of grammar, and commit shocking mur- 
ders of the Queen's English. Years ago, at Leamington, 
[ heard an excellent specimen of this class discoursing 
on the character of Noah. He quite charmed me by his 
piety, good sense, and genuine, though rude, eloquence. 
There was no mistaking the ring of the true metal ; but 
for a moment the spell was broken and my gravity lost^ 
when, having shown the Patriarch to have been an heir 
of grace, he, dropping the w, and sounding out the h of 
'* an heir," rose to the climax with this rapturous excla- 
mation : " My friends, my friends, Noah was a hare ! " 
Such blunders, no doubt, the " local " preachers occa- 
sionally fall into ; yet, sneer at them who may, they have 
done much good, and are worthy of " double honour/' 
They do not " eat the bread of idleness." Engaged in 
secular employments to support themselves and their 
femilies for six days of the week, on the seventh they 



MEW BRIGHTON. 31 



leave their homes to dispense the " bread of life " without 
fee or reward. Often trudging on long journeys through 
mud, and rain, and storm, they are worthy representa- 
tives of the men who in Wesley's days were " ministers 
of God's Word in much patience, in afflictions, in neces- 
sities, in distresses, in strifes, in imprisonments, in 
tumults, in labours, in watchings, in fastings." The 
Churches cannot dispense with an educated ministry; 
still, the preaching of some of these men might recom- 
mend to educated clergymen the careful cultivation of 
that natural oratory which, in these " locals," often more 
than makes up for their ignorance of mathematics and 
metaphysics, of Greek and Latin, and of any other lan- 
guage than their own mother tongue. Another pecu- 
liarity worthy of note, and certainly of imitation, among 
the Methodists, is the fervour and universality with 
which they join in the Psalmody. They take great 
delight in this part of divine worship ; nor leave it, as is 
often done by others, to choirs and hired performers — 
and making good this saying of one of themselves, " The 
Episcopalians have carried off the prajdng, and the Pres- 
byterians the preaching, so we Methodists have had to 
take up the singing." 

In all its physical features. New Brighton is a place 
where even ennui might fall in love with life. The 
mouth of the river is often alive with vessels of all shapes 
and sizes : — shrimp and pilot boats ; sloops and schoo- 
ners j brigs and barques ; steamers, — some moved 
silently through the water by their screws, others making 
the air resound with the thud of their paddles ; ships of 



32 NEW BRIGHTON. 



heaviest burden, gay with flags, with sails bright and full 
as the plumage of a swan, homeward or outward bound 
— all floating on a tide which, whether stealing gently up 
to your feet as if to kiss them, or thundering in with 
breakers that burst in explosions of spray on the head- 
lands or dash themselves foaming on the beach, is an 
object of perpetual interest. A place for the lady who 
said, " O, how I do love the sea when I am on the 
land ! '* — it is particularly suitable for such invalids as, 
from age or infirmity, are " afraid of that which is high." 
In its broad, firm sands, it offers them an advantage not 
to be found in many more lovely places on this coast 
— surveyed by us under very pecuHar circumstances. 
The story may be told as a warning to travellers, in the 
words of the Scotch proverb, to "look before they 
leap : "— 

We left this place one day for Bangor, intending to 
return the next. In the railway-carriage we began to 
compare, not notes, but purses; and were dismayed 
to find ourselves short of money. Most awkward di- 
lemma ! — what was to be done ? Necessity is the mother 
of invention ; we might pawn our watches ; or we might 
summon the landlady, and bid her judge whether we 
looked like sharpers, or decent, though unfortunate, 
people whom she might trust. " As," to use a common 
saying, "ill-luck would have it," we had neither letter, 
nor envelope, to establish our identity; and, instead of 
portmanteau with brass plate and name, only a borrowed, 
black, nameless, leathern bag — not in keeping with such 
persons as we professed to be, but looking rather like an 



NEW BRIGHTON. 33 



article such as hotel-plunderers travel with to carry off 
silver plate. What black ruminations and grave whisper- 
ings were ours, as we bowled along to certain beggary 
and probable disgrace. Though I fancied our presence 
was somewhat more impressive than that of an Edinburgh 
lawyer who once had to make such an appeal as we had 
in view, yet his fate stuck like a bone in my throat. 
Going on horseback to a dinner-party, this worthy gentle- 
man found himself barred by a turnpike, and a demand 
for twopence. He had not a penny in his pocket ; but 
gave tongue in lieu of money — opening his case with 
counsellor-like glibness, and closing it with a promise to 
pay. The gruff warder was not to be so taken in ; and 
planted himself firmly before the man of briefs. They 
wrangled; and the lawyer, at length losing temper in 
this passage of arms, turned round on the other, and, 
drawing himself up, said, " Look at me, sir ; do I look 
like a man who would cheat you?" Whereupon the 
gate-keeper measured him from head to heel ; and then 
held out his hand to say, " Let's see the twopence ! " 
Haunted by this story, we drove on to the George Hotel, 
and, anxious to know our fate, instantly asked to see the 
landlady. She was engaged at the time; and, though 
feeling somewhat as a man who, on going to a dentist's 
to have a tooth extracted, has to wait half an hour, there 
was nothing for it but to have patience — and enjoy our 
dinner as we best could. At table I could not help 
thinking of those penniless fellows, sad rogues, who, shift- 
ing their quarters daily, dine in London coffee-houses ; 
and, though always meeting the bill with a promise to 



34 NEW BRIGHTON. 



pay, are not believed, but hauled up before the Lord 
Mayor. Not that we could entirely sympathise with 
their sufferings; having found, on rummaging purses 
and pockets, money enough for our instant return by the 
last train, and at the lowest fare. However, things did 
not come to that pass. On our excellent landlady ap- 
pearing, and hearing matters explained, she laughed 
heartily at our dilemma, and, pulling out what a child 
called " a fat purse," offered us gold at demand. " All is 
well that ends well," — so says the proverb — but the 
experiment is dangerous ; and elsewhere than in city 
mobs it is well to remember the policeman's warning, 
Ladies and gentlemen, look to your purses ! 

Yo-yo-yo, coming in long-drawn musical sounds over 
the quiet morning sea from a noble ship, which with 
every yard of canvas spread out on bowsprit, mizen, main, 
and foremast, is now entering the Mersey on her way to 
Liverpool, prompts me to write sailor-wise ; but having 
" spun so long a yarn " about this place, I must now con- 
clude. A pleasant sight it must be to see this beach 
crowded on Saturday afternoons, and summer holidays, 
with lads and lasses, and honest men, the strong sinews 
of our country, accompanied by their " belongings " — 
bright-looking wives, and groups of merry children. 
These find refreshment in wooden booths, ranged along 
the beach ; whose " Signs," being neither bottles of 
whisky nor foaming jugs of porter, say much for the 
sober habits of the bulk of the people. "Hot Water ** 
stands painted on their walls in great, white, staring let- 
ters. Hot Water ! associated as these words used to be 



NEW BRIGHTON. 35 



in our mind with the manufacture of whisky toddy, they 
at first startled us ; but a near approach dissipated all 
fears. I learned with great satisfaction that it is the ad- 
mirable practice of many of the working-classes on these 
occasions to bring tea and coffee with them. Instead of 
repairing for refreshments, so called, to beer-shops or 
tap-rooms, they resort to these booths to prepare and 
enjoy " the cup that cheers but not inebriates " j and so, 
in these houses, where hot water, tea and coffee, ham 
and eggs, stand in happy and harmless association, they 
find " public-houses " which, holding no licence, lead to 
no licentiousness. It made one happy to see in these 
" Signs " the signs of a general sobriety, and sound argu- 
ments in favour of holidays for those whose hard yet 
happy lot it is, to work to live and live to work. Wisely 
managed, such holidays would contribute much to the 
enjoyments of the working-classes, and eminently con- 
duce also to the quiet and holy rest of the Lord's day — 
to answer that prayer offered in all Episcopal Churches, 
when on the Ten Commandments being read, according 
to their excellent practice, every Sabbath, all the people, 
at the fourth as at the others, respond, saying, "Lord 
have mercy upon us, and incline our hearts to keep 
this law l" 



»• 




A WINTER GALE. 



•* What happy gale 
Blows you to Padua here from old Verona?"— Shakes PE AM: 

•• Of gentlest gale Arabian odours fann'd 
From their soft wings and Flora's earhest smells." — MiLTON. 



INCE the days of these grand old poets, or that 
still earlier period when, a synonym for singing, 
it gave its name to the nightingale, the word 
" gale " has changed its meaning. Ignorant of this, an 
unfortunate preacher who was on one occasion officiating 
in a seaport town, prayed that the husbands, sons, and 
brothers of those before him, then at sea, might have "/r<?- 
pitious gales. ^^ The storm of indignation this raised among 
the women was to him incomprehensible, as it may be to 
some of our readers who think that he was guilty of no 
offence but the very bad taste of using pompous lan- 
guage in prayer. This, however, was not the " front of his 
offending" with these women. A simple and primitive 
race, they might have found no great fault with the use 
of terms passing their understanding — any more than the 
honest woman who, on being asked whether she under- 



A WINTER GALE. 37 



Stood one whom she pronounced a grand preacher, 
replied, " D'ye think I wad presume to understand him ? 
Na, na /" Gales they understood too well. It was in a 
gale that Johnny Flucker's father was lost. It was in 
a gale that Jenny Swanson lost her husband, and in 
another her two lads. It was a gale that sank four 
fishing boats with all their crews in sight of distracted 
wives and weeping children on the beach; filling the 
little fishing town, where all the families intermarried 
with each other, with lamentation, mourning, and woe. 
They did not understand ^^ propitious'' ; but that only 
added fuel to the flames. Their alarmed fancies imagined 
it something particularly bad ; for what else could come 
from the Kps of a man who prayed for " gales." 

This story illustrates one of the peculiarities of those 
who go down to the sea in ships. Their vocabulary 
differs, as much as their habits, from that of landsmen. 
Last summer, for example, we crossed to the Orkneys, 
where we met for the first time an Atlantic swell ; the 
waves — long, lofty, majestic ridges of water — came rolling 
from the coasts of Labrador to dash themselves in sheets 
of foam on the gigantic cliffs of Hoy. We took a rough 
measurement of their height, and found that when our 
little steamer was down in the trough of the sea, the top 
of the wave was not less than twenty or thirty feet above 
us. The wind was in keeping with the waves ; most of 
those aboard were prostrate on the deck ; yet, according 
to our excellent captain, with whom we talked as we 
watched the gambols of a " school " of whales, it only 
blew " rather firesh." One night, years ago, we encoun- 



A WINTER GALE. 



tered still fouler weather in the Channel. " Steward ! 
Steward ! " had been called out in all the notes of the 
gamut; the passengers had been sick as dogs; glasses 
had been rattling, doors slamming, timbers groaning ; 
wedged firmly into our berth, we had been marvelling all 
night long how the steward and cabin boy kept their 
feet as they steered their course across the floor — minis- 
tering angels in this scene of wretchedness ; and, on 
arriving at St. Helier's, men and women came from below, 
pale and wan as ghosts ; yet to our exclamation on leav- 
ing, " A stormy voyage, captain ! " we got no other 
answer but *' blew rather fresh," or " a bit of a sea." 
Sailors are slow to speak ill of their element. Storm, 
tempest, and hurricane are terms almost unknown to 
their vocabulary. The word they ordinarily use for these 
is the fine, poetical term employed by the unfortunate 
preacher who prayed for " gales ; " and they mark the 
character of the storm by such modifications of it as a 
whole gale, or half a gale. 

The nature of those atmospherical commotions, which 
are so destructive to life and property both at sea and 
land, is now pretty well understood ; and may be made 
intelligible to those who know little of science, by a 
familiar illustration. In a bright summer's day, when 
the heat is scorching and the air a dead calm, you see a 
sudden and unaccountable motion begin to stir the dust 
which coats the road. Whirling round and round within 
a space of one or two feet, it rises at length into the 
form of a round pillar. I have seen it as high as two or 
three feet This column may be observed to have two 



A WINTER GALE. |9 



distinct motions — first, its materials whirl in a circle 
round its axis with greater or less velocity ; and secondly, 
the column itself moves at the same time along the road 
at a greater or less speed — continuing to whirl round, and 
also to advance, till the cause which produced it ceasing 
to act, it drops its burden and gradually disappears. 
This is a petty whirlwind. When these whirlwinds are 
formed on a large scale, they exert an enormous power 
of drawing up whatever comes within their reach, as was 
illustrated by one which occurred in the neighbourhood 
of my old sea-coast parish. First descried out at sea as 
a vast column of water advancing to the shore, it struck 
the land near a fishing village, and where a number of 
boats lay high and dry on the beach. Some were herring- 
boats, of seven or ten tons burden ; and these it turned 
over, while it not only whirled the smaller craft off the 
ground, but lifted them so high into the air that they 
were shattered in their fall. Now this double motion, 
namely, one of the body of air around an axis, and the 
other of progress over the surface, seen so well in the 
familiar phenomenon to which I have referred, charac- 
terises all gales or great storms. The tornadoes, as they 
are called, which, entering an American forest, and doing 
more work in an hour than ten hundred thousand axes, 
level trees in long gaps of yards or miles in breadth, and 
also the typhoons, so fatal to ships in the Chinese seas, 
have long been known to be winds which have both a 
revolving and progressive motion. And now, by a series 
of extended and continuous observations, it has been 
proved that all our great storms are of the same cha- 



40 A WINTER GALB. 



racter ; only, instead of a diameter of a few yards or 
miles, they go round in their gyrations on a circle of one, 
or of several, hundred miles in diameter. 

The power of the gale does not lie in that progressive 
motion by which it advances from place to place. Much 
the same in the weakest as in the greatest storms, this 
has no destructive power. For example, the centre of 
the late great storm (December, 1863), according to 
M. Marie Davy, who is entrusted with the meteorological 
department at the Observatory at Paris, travelled at no 
greater rate than that of ten leagues an hour. This pro- 
gressive motion of a storm is not only comparatively 
slow, but, owing to causes which we have not yet dis- 
covered and never may discover, it appears capricious — 
as I have seen illustrated by the column of dust already 
referred to, which, after advancing straight forward on 
one side of the road, would, without any apparent reason, 
cross to the other; and then, as if it had taken another 
thought, commence a retrograde movement. For ex- 
ample, according to M. Marie Davy, the late storm, 
which was born in lower latitudes, reached Ireland on 
the I St of December j its centre being about sixty leagues 
from the north-west coast of that island. On the morning 
of the 2nd its centre was in the neighbourhood of Shrews- 
bury, while at one o'clock of that day it was raging 
furiously at Paris. Driven back to the north, its centre 
on the 3rd was in the neighbourhood of York. There- 
after, resuming its natural course, it moved eastward, and, 
smiting Copenhagen on the 4th and on the 5th, left the 
Baltic between Libau an(i Kcenigsberg on its way to 



A WINTER GALE. 



Russia. In this progressive motion we have the key to 
the prophetic-like power by which Admiral Fitzroy, sit- 
ting in London, warns the fishers of Nairn on the one 
hand, or the sailors of Rochelle on the other, to look out 
for a gale ; and in its capriciousness we have, perhaps, 
one explanation of the occasional failure of the Admiral's 
predictions. The science is yet in its infancy ; but the 
future is full of hope. " By certain tests," to quote the 
Admiral's own words, " one is able to tell, within a sweep 
of 500 miles from London, what changes or movements 
are impending in the air. Certainty is not yet attainable, 
but a fair average probability for a certain area is already 
within our reach. It is by a continuous observation of 
the changes, and indications of changes, that we are now 
enabled to decide and direct with confidence." The old 
saying may ever in a certain sense hold true that " the 
wind bloweth where it listeth, and thou hearest the sound 
thereof, but canst not tell whence it cometh, or whither 
it goeth j " yet, though we should never advance another 
step, we have the satisfaction of knowing that Admiral 
Fitzroy and others have made discoveries, which will con- 
tinue to save from the devouring ocean millions' worth 
of valuable property, and thousands of precious lives. 

The real force of the wind in a gale lies in the circular 
motion of the body of air ; and by anemometers, we are 
able to accurately determine the amount of this — the 
power, or, what is the same thing, the rapidity of the 
wind. These instruments were once constructed on the 
principle that the cooling power of a current of ail 
depends on its velocity — as is practically illustrated by 



A WINTER GALE. 



boys who blow on their porridge to cool it ; others were 
constructed on the equally well-known principle that the 
evaporation of water is proportionable to the velocity of 
the wind — a fact familiar to washerwomen who find 
clothes dry much faster in a breezy than in a quiet day. 
These, and many others besides, have given place to 
instruments which, by wind-mill flies, or a system of 
rotating hemispherical cups, set in motion a series of 
wheels that indicate, and, being self-registering, also 
record both the direction and velocity of the wind. 

The following table shows the pressure which different 
winds will exert upon a square foot of surface exposed 
directly against them ; and as it also describes the cha- 
racter of the winds, the reader will be able to form a 
rough guess both of the power and of the rate of any 
wind that may be going : — 



Velocity of 

Wind. 

Miles per 

Hour. 


Force on One 
Square Foot. 


Character of Wind. 


I 

4 

15 

25 
36 
45 
50 
62 
80 
95 

lOI 

108 


.005 
.079 

1. 107 

2. 

5. , 

9. 

10. ) 
15. 

26. 1 

37- J 
41. 

46.5 


Hardly perceptible. 
Gentle, pleasant, wind. 
Pleasant, but brisk. 
Very brisk. 
High winds. 

Very high. 

Great storm. 

Hurricane. 

Destructive hurricane. 



This table shows that a hurricane travels at the rate of 



A WINTER GALE. 43 



eighty or ninety miles an hour — about the speed of an 
eagle at her full flight, and exerts a pressure of thirty 
pounds on the square foot ; and that a destructive hurri- 
cane exerts a pressure of forty or fifty pounds on the 
square foot, rushing through the air at double the highest 
rate of an express train. 

The gale of the 3rd of December was a destructive 
hurricane. It would appear, from observations made at 
Liverpool, that its utmost severity fell on that town and 
its neighbourhood j for according to the anemometers in 
the Observatory there, its pressure between eight and 
ten o'clock of the forenoon of the 3rd of December was 
equal to forty-three pounds on the square foot ; and this 
is the highest ever registered at that observatory, and 
considerably higher than the registers of this gale at 
London, or any other place. Interesting as the above 
table is, it will convey to many a very imperfect idea of 
the power of the wind to raise storms, before which the 
stoutest ships of oak or iron may be crushed, like an egg 
shell. One or two facts which have come under my own 
eye, may convey to most readers a more distinct and 
vivid idea of the power of the sea in such a gale. 

The manse of my country parish commanded a view 
of the Bell Rock Lighthouse, which stands boldly out in 
the sea twelve miles fiom the coast of Forfarshire, and, 
protected by no headland, is exposed to all the fury of 
the German Ocean. It rises from a reef, laid bare at 
low water, to the height of 100 feetj yet I have seen 
the wave which rushed and struck against it, mount to 
its very summit; and, wrapping the tower ii a sheet of 



44 A WINTER GALE. 



snowy foam, make it suddenly appear through the gloom 
of the tempest, like a spectre ; it is said that occasionally 
the waves are hurled against it with such enormous 
power, that they rush up one side, a sheet of unbroken 
water, to pour over its top, like a cascade on the other. 
Some years ago I went to see the lighthouse which, 
standing on Dunnet Head, the Cape Orcas of the 
Romans, guards the mouth of the Pentland Firth, and 
marks the western opening of that tempestuous channel. 
The cliff from which it rises is more than 200 feet high, 
and the tower itself, which stands on its brink, is at 
least seventy. It is lighted by means of Fresaers diop- 
tric apparatus — a beautiful invention, whereby, through 
a series of prisms, all the rays of light which do not fall 
in the first instance on the reflector are caught, thrown 
back on it, and then shot away, right out, on the Atlantic 
Thus, by gathering up the fragments that nothing may 
be lost, as well as from the height of the cliff on which 
it shines, this light is visible at a distance of not less than 
twenty-three nautical miles — a distance exceeded by no 
lighthouse on the coast of Scotland, save those off Barra 
Head and Cape Wrath. Well, on ascending the tower 
to examine the Frenchman's beautifid and ingenious 
device, I observed the thick plate-glass windows of the 
lanthorn cracked, starred in a number of places. It 
could not be there, as in our towns, when some wretched 
drunkard, reeling along the pavement, lurches against a 
plate-glass shop window. Wild geese and other birds 
in their migrations, during the darkness, were, I knew, 
often attracted by such lights, and striking against the 



A WINTER GAUL 45 



glass of the lanthoms, occasionally broke it; but, not 
seeing how any bird could crack so thick a plate, I 
turned to the keeper for an explanation. It appears 
that it is done by stones flung up by the sea. The wave, 
on being thrown forward against the cliff, strikes it with 
such tremendous force as to hurl the loose stones at its 
base right up to the height of 300 feet. A very remark- 
able circumstance ; and one from which the reader may 
form some conception of the power of the sea in such a 
gale as that of the 3rd December. 

Another proof of this is occasionally seen in great 
grandeur on the neighbouring and equally stormy coasts. 
Hoy Head, in Orkney, is one of the noblest sea cliffs, if 
not the noblest, in her Majesty's dominions, or almost 
anywhere else. In front of it, some thirty or fifty feet 
from its base, stands the remarkable rock called the Old 
Man of Hoy ; its form rises out of the sea, to the height 
of 300 feet, singularly like that of an old man wrapt in a 
cloak, and looking meditatively out on the Atlantic 
ocean. But the headland in front of which he stands, as 
James Wilson said, with his feet always cold, is, in that 
part called the Brow of the Brae, one sheer, unbroken 
crag of 1 1 50 feet. I can believe this ; for I remember, 
when sailing along in front of and close by it, how the 
sea fowl at its summit looked more like swallows than 
great long-winged gulls. Now, the Orcadians told me 
that in a hurricane, they have seen an Atlantic wave 
strike this headland in such volume, and with such 
power, that it has rushed half way up the cliff, throwing 
itself in its great but impotent rage, to the height of 



46 A WINTER GALB. 



nearly 600 feet Hurled by such a sea against such a 
crag, a man-of-war, though built of the strongest oak and 
bound with the toughest iron, would be shattered, like a 
ship of glass. 

Perhaps, the graphic terms of some of the seamen 

examined by the court which sat on the loss of the 

" Royal Charter," will convey a more vivid idea of the 

power of the sea in a gale than even facts could do. After 

a long voyage round half the globe, four hundred and 

eighty souls perished in that dreadful wreck, within sight 

of home. Yet though the gale on that occasion did not, 

according to anemometers, at Liverpool exert a pressure 

equal to that of the 3rd of December, such were the 

power and fury of the sea, that it seized masses of rock 

of fourteen tons weight, and, tearing them up, bowled 

them along the sands to hurl them on the shores of 

Anglesea. The " Royal Charter " was one of the most 

powerful auxiliary steamships of her day. She registered 

nearly 3000 tons burden; and was built of the best 

metal our hammers could forge, all bound together in 

one rigid mass by the strongest rivets. Yet when she 

met her fate, an engineer, in describing the catastrophe, 

says that, " on taking the rocks, such a sea struck her on 

cwo angles, that it broke her back, just as I would a 

stick across my knee;''' or, as one of the few survivors 

said, speaking of this vast, firmly bound mass of iron, 

the sea broke her as one would smash a pipe stump. All 

diis only leaves us to wonder, and bless Him who holds 

the winds in his fist and the lives of seamen in his hand, 

;that tlie gale which I am now to describe, as seen and 



A WINTER GALE. 47 



felt at New Brighton, did not work more havoc on 
an element of which the poet truly and touchingljr 
sings — 

" Thou canst not name one tender tie 
But there dissolved its relics lie." 

I may begin with the copy of a letter which I wrote to 
Edinburgh, on the afternoon of Thursday, the 3rd of 
December: — ", . . . On Tuesday, the ist. Admiral 
Fitzroy, who would have made a fortune two hundred 
years ago by selling winds to seamen, if he was fortunate 
enough to escape being drowned or burned as a warlock, 
had sent notice to all the seaports that on Wednesday 
and Thursday the wind would blow from the west, strong 
to a gale. Well, yesterday morning his prediction 
seemed as worthless as those of Moore's Almanack, 
where we used to have the wind and weather given from 
the January of the one year to the January of the next 
The sky was hazy; the air a dead calm; and the sea 
smooth as a mill-pond. But, as we took our forenoon 
saunter on the sands, the curtain which hid Waterloo, a 
suburb of Liverpool which stands facing us on the oppo- 
site shore, suddenly lifted; and though two or three 
miles of water lie between us and its houses, they stood 
out as distinctly as if they were not a third of the dis- 
tance away. A pretty sure sign of a change, this was the 
pause before the battle, the gleam before the storm. 

" A short while, and the sky began to darken and the 
wind to rise ; and in less than an hour the heavens and 
earth were in wild commotion. The tempest roared; 



A WINTER GALE, 



the sea foamed with rage ; and the sand on its shore was 
blown, as I never saw sand blown before — scudding 
along like a low mist, to form, wherever it encountered 
house or wall, great heaps, like wreaths of snow, only 
they were grey in place of white, and drifting landward 
in clouds, as if its purpose was to bury the town. So it 
continued all day long. We made some attempts to go 
out, but were glad to beat a retreat ; for the wind was 
absolutely choking, the sand filled our nostrils, ears, and 
mouth, and, so far as the eyes were concerned, it was 
what the Scotch call a blind drift. As the night fell 
down, so did the storm, — it seemed to have worn itself 
out, and gone to sleep with the rest of the world. But, 
as if its exhausted energies had been restored by a night's 
repose, the gale returned with double fury on Thursday 
morning. 

" No boat could leave our landing-stage for Liverpool, 

so that was ' storm-stay' d,' and had to spend the 

day with us, instead of in his office. Some gentlemen, 
anxious to get to their places of business, set off in a van 
for Birkenhead, intending to cross from thence to Liver- 
pool, as almost no weather stops the ferry-boats so far up 
the river. It was a bold, but unsuccessful attempt. The 
hurricane capsized the van, and emptied its freight on the 
road — a disaster which also befell the milk-cart, to the 
detriment of our breakfast. You remember the storms 
we sometimes had at Lochlee ; and how, roaring down 
into the glen from the peak of Cragmaskeldie, they blew 
the water in great sheets out of the river, and, falling in 
whirlwinds on the loch, whisked up clouds of spray as 



A WINTER GALE. 49 



high as the neighbouring hills. Yet the storm to-day 
beat any we ever saw there. Blowing through every 
chink of doors and windows, it has coated chairs, tables, 
carpets, the whole interior of the house, with sand. And 
how it sounds ! — whistling, howling, shrieking, yelling ; 
and in our bed-room, where it has found out some curi- 
ously constructed crevice, humming with a noise like the 
thousand spindles of a mill, or such as you could fancy 
coming from the drone of a Highland bagpipe, as big as 
the pipes of a church organ. 

" The town, from which our servant who ventured out 
has just returned, looks like a deserted city — no shop 
open, and nobody in the streets. Such was the strength 
of the gale, that it took me, the two lads, and a servant, 
to shut our front door. The servant had incautiously 
opened it, and was at once laid on her back in the 
lobby. 

" The sea is in an awful turmoil ; thundering on the 
shore ; and ever and anon some great wave hurls itself 
against the fort, making grand explosions, if I may say 
so ; throwing the most beautiful clouds of spray high in 
the air above the cannon which crown the massive walls. 
The gale has blown such a mass of water inshore, that 
had this been a time of spring, instead of neap tides, the 
ground story of our house would probably have been 
afloat ; and with sand in the upper story, without the sea 
in the lower, we have discomforts enough. But these 
have been little thought of We have been thinking of 
the poor fellows who are fighting for life out on the 
stormy deep; and have also been rejoicing with them 



50 A WINTER GALS. 



that do rejoice — with some whom we have seen come 
safe out of the battle. Sand, wind, rain, everything was 
forgotten, as another and another barque hove in sight, 
and we turned our glasses to see her as she came rolling, 
pitching, ploughing through the mist and foam to take 
the Mersey, and feel herself safe on passing the fort and 
lighthouse. 

" Not more in all than three or four have ventured in ; 
and these perhaps, because the gale caught them so near 
shore that they could not beat out to sea. The sight of 
these vessels returning shattered, but safe, from a deadly 
conflict with the elements, carried me back nearly half a 
century to the day when the whole of Edinburgh crushed 
into the High Street and Canongate to welcome the sur- 
vivors of the 42nd Highlanders on their return from 
Waterloo. The spectators filled every window of the 
seven and eight-storied houses, crowded every roofj and 
clustered, like swarms of bees, on the chimney tops ; and 
it was a stirring sight to see that small band of gallant 
men marching up to the Castle, some with their arms in 
slings, patches still on the naked limbs that trode and on 
the brave bronzed faces that looked upon that bloody 
field, and, waving over their heads, amid cheers that rent 
the air and seemed to shake out their folds, the torn 
colours which they had borne into the fight, and brought 
out of it with Highland honour. I had seen that grand 
sight when I was a boy ; and it was recalled to my recol- 
lection as vessel after vessel came in, each bearing plain 
evidence of the struggle she had had for life. Save one 
low sail to steer by and keep them off shore, they did 



A WINTER GALE. 5I 



not show a bit of canvas, nor could they. All had been 
blown from the bolts, or torn to rags ; and their remnants 
were flying from the yards like ribbons — shreds of flesh 
on a skeleton, or, as in the case of some of their jibs, 
draggling from the bowsprit through the sea. As each 
went past, now showing her keel as she lurched over the 
top of a wave, and then, as she went down into the 
trough of the sea, burying her hull and showing only 
naked masts — the waves now flying in clouds of spray 
among her yards, and now leaping bodily on her deck to 
sweep it fore and aft — we watched the scene with the 
deepest interest ; we mentally congratulated the poor 
fellows ; we thanked God that they were safe ; and we 
would have sent forth a cheer had there been any chance 
of its reaching them, — but human voices were lost amid 
the crash of the waves and the everlasting roar of the 

hurricane " So ran the letter. 

On the morning of the day after the gale, which had 
entirely gone down during the night, we turned our 
glasses on the shores and sand-banks. Three vessels 
lay stranded on the opposite beach ; a fourth was fast on 
a bank on our side of the channel, the waves breaking 
furiously over her hull ; and further out the masts of a 
fifth, which had gone down in deep water, were sticking 
up like bare poles. But our attention was soon drawn 
to a sight which recalled the old, barbarous days when, 
by lighting fires on the shore, men, regardless of the 
lives of the crews, lured vessels to their destruction ; or 
rather to still later times when, though no attempts were 
made to wreck vessels, little scruple was felt about plun- 

E 2 



5* A WINTER GALE. 

dering such as happened to come ashore. I knew the 
son of a minister of Lunan, in my native county and old 
presbytery, of whom they tell that when he was preach- 
ing one Sabbath, he saw one and another of his parish- 
ioners rise and leave the church. On looking out at a 
window, nigh the pulpit, to see what had happened out- 
side to cause this inside commotion, he descried a vessel 
ashore in the bay. He knew that his worthy people 
held all that the sea gave them as a special gift from 
God ; and that, regardless of the rights of owners, or 
perhaps even of the lives of sailors, they would throw 
themselves on the wreck like wolves on a carcase — 
every man for himself. As eccentric as he was humane 
and honest, it occurred to him that the only way to stop 
the plunder, and perhaps save the perishing, was to 
appear to make himself one of the party — as bad as the 
others. So, hastily closing the Bible, he left the pulpit, 
and, as he hurried down the stairs, shouted to the crowd 
who were making for the door, '* Halt, halt, sirs ! — let's 
a' start fair ! " 

Now, here in the grey of the morning, we first saw 
four or five people moving along shore, and by and by 
returning with burdens on their shoulders. In a little 
while, as do crows when some one or two of the black 
fraternity have discovered a store of worms, the numbers 
rapidly increased ; at length carts, some drawn by don- 
keys and others by horses, appeared on the scene. We 
could not fancy what this stir was about ; but on going 
out, got it explained. During the night more than one 
vessel had gone to pieces not far from our doors. Right 



A WINTER GALE. S3 



before our house lay a pile of articles on the sand, the 
vestiges of a wreck — part of a ship's stem, a lot of shat- 
tered planks, a short ladder, a pail, some handspikes, 
and, among many smaller articles, a rude, wooden spec- 
tacle-case ; which last was all I appropriated of the 
wreck. He whc? had been its owner had found a watery 
grave ; and it was of no value to any one — nor to me, 
but as a souvenir of the gale. On going along the 
beach, we found it strewed with ribs of ships, broken 
masts, yards, oars, the chaff of beds, pillow-cases, and 
various articles of ship furniture. As if women as well as 
men had perished, I saw a petticoat floating about among 
other wreck amid the waves. But what pained one most 
to see, was something lying on the sand, which suggested 
a terrible, but vain struggle for life — the step of a mast 
with a rope tied to it, the lower end of which had been 
made into a loop, sustained by which some poor fellow 
had hoped to float ashore. It had come ashore, not he, 
— his fate only less painful, because his agony was less 
prolonged, than his whose dead body was found, some 
days after the gale, wandering about in the sea, buoyed 
up by a life-preserver. 

A welcome relief from the melancholy fancies of death 
and drowning struggles these sights produced, we had 
the satisfaction of looking at a ship's crew who had 
escaped the jaws of destraction but some hours before. 
Their schooner had gone on the banks some half-mile 
off land, in the dead of night. We confess to sympa 
thising with their small, wiry, grey terrier, which, with 
canine sagacity, had also taken to the boat, and was 



54 A WINTER GALE. 



now wheeling round us, ploughing the sand with his 
nose, barking and frisking about as if he felt life all the 
sweeter for having been so nearly lost. The sad matter 
was that they were not all there j one was in the bottom 
of the sea — a fine young fellow, whom they left alone on 
the ship's deck, with not an hour to live. When she 
struck and began to break up, they all took to their 
boat, hoping to make the shore ; but the boat was still 
attached to the ship by the painter, as the rope is called. 
This should have been cut. In the confusion the lad 
who was lost leapt once more aboard to loosen it ; and 
before he could return, an immense wave, seizing the 
boat, swept it away, and left him standing alone on the 
deck. The shore and life were on this side, and that 
poor perishing man on the other ; yet they would have 
run the risk of returning for him, but could not. The 
wave which swept them away, besides filling their boat 
almost to the gunwale, and almost swamping her, carried 
off one of their two oars. They could do nothing. So, 
while they were drifted to the beach, he was left to die 
alone ; and we were left to hope that God was with him 
in that terrible hour, and that the wave which swept him 
into eternity found him on his knees, and with his last 
breath washed a prayer for mercy from his lips. 

Near by the scene of this catastrophe, and but a little 
way off shore, there floated, like a great black coflin, the 
hull of another schooner, bottom up. None knew where, 
or how her crew had perished. But they were all 
drowned, six in number; and, with them, three Liver- 
pool pilots, who, after conducting other ships safely out 



A WINTER GALE. 55 



to sea, went on board of her with the intention of return- 
ing to their port. With all these hands to work, and 
with the best of skill to guide her, down she went ; for 
it is on the sea as on the land, — " the race is not always 
to the swift, nor the battle to the strong." A sore battle 
indeed it had been, as many vessels showed, which, by 
help of a bit of a sail, or drawn by tugs, passed us that 
day and the next on their way to Liverpool. Some with 
bulwarks stove in or torn off flush with the deck ; some 
wit? yards blown away, or the sails hanging from them 
like ribbons ; some with the stump of a mast standing 
like a tree snapped by the middle, or every mast cut 
clean away by the board — they came, entering the river 
as the best of men, when life's storms are over, shall 
enter Heaven, " scarcely saved." 

The ravages of this gale were felt all along our coasts. 
It was said that from eighteen to twenty-seven vessels 
had foundered in the harbour at Holyhead, and that as 
many as sixty-eight bodies had been washed ashore there. 
This was an exaggeration; but there is no doubt that 
hundreds of vessels were wrecked in this gale, and that 
the loss of life was terrible. For example, more than loo 
men and boys have perished belonging to one seaport — 
Yarmouth ; and hundreds more would have perished but 
for the brave and almost superhuman exertions of our 
lifeboat crews. What these gallant men dare, and do, 
may be illustrated by the following story. Towed out 
by a tug, the lifeboat slipt her cable, and bore down 
amid the darkness of the night and through a terrific 
sea, on a large stranded ship — steering for the tar bairels 



56 A WINTER GALE. 



which she was burning on her deck as a signal of dis- 
tress. With all his faults, the sailor is as kind and gallant 
as he is brave; and so after they had got alongside erf 
her with the greatest difficulty, they shouted to those on 
board to first save the women and children. The scene 
at the same time was appalling — the howling of the 
wind, mingled with the shrieks of the women and the 
rush of the waves against the sides of the ship, accus- 
tomed as the boat's crew were to such sights, made them 
doubly anxious. At the first trip, they took off twenty- 
five women and children, carrying them to the tug. 
Again she helped them into a position to run down on 
the ship, and back and forward went these brave men 
through that roaring sea, till they had rescued every 
passenger at the imminent peril of their own lives. They 
had hardly begun to think of the repose they needed so 
much, and had earned so well, when a new call was 
made on their energies. Another large vessel was 
stranded. She lay on her beam ends, with her crew 
exhausted and the sea making a clean breach over them. 
Responding to the call of duty and humanity, these noble 
fellows went again to the work. The danger was greater 
than ever, but they faced it; and before that Hfeboat 
crew rested on their oars, they landed in all about 120 
souls. Talk of courage ! where is it to be found nobler ; 
or in a nobler cause ? We would hope that the services 
bravely rendered to humanity by lifeboat crews in the 
late gale, will secure a larger measure of support to Life- 
boat Institutions than they have hitherto received. They 
have not been supported up either to their necessities or 



A WINTER GALE. 57 



merits; nor have the services of our seamen, whether 
belonging, or not belonging, to lifeboats, who have put 
their lives in peril to save others, met the acknowledg- 
Mcnts which they deserved — and which in France they 
know so well how to bestow. At Cherbourg, for instance, 
a lieutenant and thirty-two men of a French frigate put 
off to save a merchantman foundering in the roads during 
the late gale. Their launch was upset, and they were all 
drowned — self-sacrificed in the cause of humanity. On 
this melancholy occasion the Admiral addressed an order 
of the day to the officers and crews of the fleet ; while 
the Emperor, to honour the memory of these devoted 
men, ordered their funeral to be performed with august 
ceremonies. Business was suspended in the town; the 
entire population joined in the procession ; all the troops 
and seamen in the port were under arms ; the ships of 
war carried their flags half-mast high; and cannon 
boomed at intervals to the memory of the brave. We 
would not grudge our neighbours the honour of such a 
worthy act and well-earned expression of respect, if we 
saw our Lifeboat Institutions more liberally supported, 
and more adequate rewards and honours bestowed on 
those who might often make hundreds of pounds by 
salvage, if they did not prefer the lives of drowning men 
to their own pecuniary advantage. 

This gale brings out the perils and hardships to which 
our seamen are exposed; and who can think of these, 
without feeling ashamed that so little is done by the 
nation, on behalf of men whose life is one danger, on 
whose bravery our country has often depended for her 



58 A WINTER GALE. 



safety, and on whose labours she depends for so much of 
her enormous and ever-growing wealth. Early removed 
from home and all its blessed influences; exposed to 
temptations greater even than the dangers of the deep ; 
far from the kind and guardian care of parents, sisters 
and brothers; enjoying no quiet Sabbaths, and strangers 
to the sound of the church-going bell; no sooner on 
shore, with exuberant spirits and purses full of money, 
than they are assailed by crimps, landsharks, harpies, 
who make them their prey, nor leave them till they are 
plundered of all their hard-earned wages — they should 
be the objects of our kind and Christian care. It is a 
scandal and a deep stigma on the wealth, humanity, and 
Christianity of our seaport towns, that so little is done 
for our seamen — to bless them for this world and save 
them for the next. 

As a class, those who have had to do with seamen say 
that they are kind, impressible, generous, tender-hearted, 
and very open to good influences. We have certainly 
met with some of the finest, noblest specimens of religion 
among them; and the most careless have often been 
found with such a respect for it, and sense of it, as gives 
us something to work on. We are shocked to hear them 
spoken of as a class doomed by the terrible necessity ot 
their circumstances to wasteful habits and a wicked life. 
Nor will this paper have been written in vain if it move 
the sympathy of my readers for seamen, and awaken or 
increase an interest in schemes now afloat to further 
their temporal and spiritual welfare. 




THE STREETS OF PARIS 
I. 

COMPANY of men of different tastes and pur- 
suits, bowling along the same road on the top 
of a stage-coach, view the country they pass 
through under widely different aspects. The gentleman 
with the erect air and military cap finds out that that old 
ivy-mantled fortress, nodding to its fall on the top of the 
crag, could be commanded firom the neighbouring hill ; 
and that the mountain pass through which the river foams, 
leaving scant room for the road between it and the cliffs, 
is the key of the glen into which it opens. His neighbour 
in tops, with his vast form wrapped in a heavy great coat, 
and the folds of a shawl rolled by a careful housewife 
round his ample throat, notes little else than fences to 
be repaired, or marshy places to be drained, the cha- 
racter of the stock, the progress of the crops, the size 
and condition of the farms. Of a peacefiil profession, 
and knowing nothing of Shorthorns, or any roots save 
those of the Hebrew tongue, the sedate gentleman with 
his nether limbs in priest grey is careful to reckon the 



6o THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

number of steeples which rise, as they do in many parts 
of England, from a wide sea of foliage ; and now and 
then perhaps he casts a covetous eye on a parsonage, 
snugly nestling in quiet beauty, amid roses and wood- 
bine, beside a picturesque church and its old grey tower. 
His neighbour, a brisk and business-like man, blind to 
steeples, sees only the tall chimneys that, vomiting forth 
clouds of smoke (but turning thousands of spindles), en- 
rich the country while they deform the landscape ; nor 
does he pass a free and happy stream, leaping the cas- 
cade and rushing over the rocks to wind through the 
valley like a silver snake, without lamenting its useless- 
ness — his the utilitarian soul of the Yankee who, on be- 
holding Niagara for the first time, was lost, not in speech- 
less wonder, but in calculating by the Rule of Three how 
much machinery the cataract would turn. Despising his 
utilitarian neighbour, and hating all straight-water cuts, 
whether for agricultural or manufacturing purposes, more 
because they destroy good fishing than the picturesque 
and winding form, — Hogarth's line of beauty, which 
rivers left to themselves always assume, — the last of the 
group, as the coach runs along the banks of a lovely 
stream, marks its fine runs, and the long deep stretches 
where salmon are lying ready to carry out thirty yards of 
line at a burst, and after that trial of strength and skill 
which men, not the fish, call playing, turn up their silver 
sides to the gaft or the hands that jerk them ashore. 

Different objects strike different people. Of this I 
had once a remarkable proof in the exclamation of a 
worthy woman whom I had conducted to a picturesque 



THE STREETS OP PARIS. 6l 

scene, benevolently hoping that it would afford her as 
much gratification as it always had done me. 

Above, the mountain raised a bald and rugged head 
into the blue sky ; while, save where bold crags showed 
their grey sides amid the green foliage, shaggy woods 
swept down to the river, which, rushing along with music 
in its sound, or whirling in deep, black, silent pools, 
washed its base. Guiding her through a dark pine 
forest to the point of a rock where the opening scene 
burst at once on our view, I bade her look ! She did ; 
and gave vent to her feelings in an expression of admira- 
tion — not, however, of the picturesqueness of the scene. 
An industrious and careful manager of household affairs, 
the one object which fixed her eye was a bit of green- 
sward, enamelled with daisies, that lay by the bank of 
the stream at the bottom of the gorge ; nor had my zeal 
for the picturesque other reward than to hear the honest 
soul exclaim, " A bonnie washing green ; what a bonnie 
washing green ! " 

Chacun d son gout — every one, as the French say, to 
his own taste. Behold my apology for dwelling chiefly 
in this, and future papers, on the social aspects of Paris 
and of France. With all respect for the fine arts, I will 
have little, or nothing, to say on paintings, sculpture, 
architecture, and the like ; nor will my observations bear 
any resemblance to the journal of a young gentleman 
who poists his readers up on operas and theatres, and is 
particular in telling where, to use his own expressions, he 
had a capital dinner, or a jolly wash. In attempting to 
communicate that which, having the charms of novelty 



6s THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

to myself, may be entertaining as well as instructive to 
others, the readers whom I have in my eye are not such 
as frequent visits to the Continent have made familiar 
with France, its people, and customs, and manners. 
Thousands of those who read " Good Words " have never 
crossed the Channel ; and, though not believing with our 
forefathers that the French live on frogs, and that there- 
fore, fed on substantial roast beef or good oatmeal, one 
Englishman or Scotchman can beat a dozen French, they 
may learn something of our neighbours which is both 
new and true. To these chiefly I address myself. They 
will find my observations, though perhaps as rambling as 
my movements, are not those of one who can see no 
good thing in France, nor good qualities to admire in 
French men or women. 

To plunge in medias res, I begin at once with Paris. 
It has changed more than any other city of the world 
since I first knew it in 1826, when Charles X. occupied 
a throne which has not seen a sovereign die on it for 
nearly a hundred years — through such whirls of revolu- 
tion has France passed. At that time things were in a 
very primitive state. A gutter, or open sewer, occupied 
the middle of many of the streets. These, which were 
very narrow, as well as dark by reason of the loftiness of 
tlie houses, had no trottoirs or pavement; so that it often 
happened that one's only protection, when two carriages 
passed each other, was to bolt into a shop, or draw up in 
the nearest door- way. These streets were lighted by 
lamps which hung over the gutter and were suspended 
from a cold that passed over the tnoroughfare from one 



THE STREETS OF PARIS, 63 

house to its opposite ; and hence I may remark an ex- 
pression common in the days of the Revolution, when, 
on catching some unfortunate priest or royaHst, whom 
they had hunted from his hiding-place or happened to 
meet, the mob cried, "-4 la lanternef" — To the lamp 
with him ! The arrangement for hanging the lamp sup- 
plied quite a ready means of hanging their victim, with- 
out their having to break into a shop for a rope. Though 
not fit in point of natural beauty to hold, if I may use 
such an expression, the candle to Edinburgh, Paris, under 
the hand of Napoleon, will soon boast, or may already 
boast, of being in respect of architectural beauty the 
Queen of Cities. Improvements are opening up its 
densest quarters to the breath of heaven and the light of 
day. In many instances their place is occupied by 
Boulevards, which, rising as it were by ma^c, form 
streets wide enough to allow thirty carriages to run 
abreast, and have their ample pavements bordered by 
lines of chestnuts, or other ornamental trees, to delight 
the eye with their green, and afford a pleasant shade 
under their spreading foliage. 

The spider makes its house out of its own bowels ; so, 
in a sense does Paris — where they raise, from under- 
ground quarries, the materials of which the streets are 
built Here no skin peels off, as in London, to betray a 
cheat, and show that this fine groining, and these Corin- 
thian pillars are but a sort of Brummagem ware in stone; 
plaster ornaments covering an ugly brick wall. Nor here, 
as in Edinburgh, is veritable and beautiful stonework 
begrimed in a few years by coal-smoke, spewed out from 



64 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

the foul throats of a thousand chimneys ; and on a frosty 
morning spreading over the city such a murky pall as to 
have given to what Tennyson calls " the grey metropolis 
of the North " the less respectable name of " Auld 
Reekie," — to say nothing, en passant^ of that hideous 
gas-work stalk which neither Louis Napoleon nor the 
municipality of Paris would have allowed to rise up to 
poison the air and deform the beauty of their town. The 
material of which Paris is built is a white stone j and the 
beauty of the material is even surpassed by the manner 
in which it is wrought. With hotels, spacious and 
splendid within as royal palaces, it boasts of streets 
that look quite palatial, and where one reads with 
wonder the signs of tailors, dressmakers, upholsterers, 
and such tradespeople on buildings to which the London 
houses of our noblemen are, with some exceptions, not 
to be compared. So that, if Louis Napoleon live long 
(which, for reasons to be given, I pray he may), the 
French Emperor may say of Paris what the Roman said 
of Rome : "I found it brick and left it marble." 

The pleasure which one enjoys in a promenade along 
these elegant, spacious, and brilliant streets, is not with- 
out its drawbacks. To a reflective mind, it is dashed 
somewhat by thinking of the hardships and sufferings 
which changes, certainly beautiful, and on the whole 
beneficial, have meanwhile imposed on the working- 
classes. Many large and densely -peopled quarters 
which they inhabited having been pulled down, the 
" ouvriers " find it difficult to obtain suitable accommoda- 
tion for themselves and families ; and in consequence of 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 6$ 

that, they are crowded together in such numbers in those 
that still stand, as cannot fail to be detrimental both to 
their health and morals. Much nonsense, no doubt, is 
talked and written about the diseases and deaths caused 
by overcrowding. Some statisticians, for example, take 
a respectable district of a town, and find a certain per- 
centage of death occurring there : then, they take another, 
but disreputable district, with the same number of in- 
habitants, and find that it has, say, double the number 
of deaths ; and, ascertaining that the inhabitants in the 
latter are crowded into half the space occupied by those 
in the other quarter, they leap at once to the conclusion, 
that the main, if not sole, cause of the terrible mortality 
in the disreputable district lies in overcrowding and the 
want of a sufiicient supply of pure air. We sleep with 
our bedroom window open, summer and winter — follow- 
ing at a respectful distance the practice of a celebrated 
physician whom we remember in our boyhood at college 
as " ultimus Romanorum " — the last living man of his 
generation who walked the streets with ruffles, buckles, 
and cocked hat. His practice, it was said, was to sleep 
in a bed, not only innocent of curtains, but placed right 
in the draught of two open and opposite windows. With- 
out holding such extreme views, we admit the importance 
of a supply of pure air ; and yet believe that the gentle- 
men referred to, by overlooking other elements of diseas® 
and death besides overcrowding, offer illustrations of the 
famous sapng, that " There is nothing so false as figures, 
but facts." Transfer the people among whom there is 
such a dreadful mortality to the lofty and spacious 



66 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

chambers of a palace, and unless you change their 
habits with their houses, the bills of mortality will show 
little improvement. It is drunkenness with its train of 
attendant evils, insufficient nourishment, inadequate 
clothing, cold, hunger, cruel usage, and broken hearts 
— ^want and misery in a hundred forms, to which the 
high mortality of these districts is chiefly owing. Know- 
ing what we say and whereof we affirm, we say that if 
foul air kills its thousands, drunkenness kills its tens of 
thousands ; and that therefore the statistics of the mor- 
tality in such districts, by attributing the deadly results 
chiefly, if not entirely, to overcrowding, are fallacious. 
Worse still, they turn attention away from that vice 
which, to say nothing of precious souls, costs our 
country, year by year, millions of money and thou- 
sands of lives. 

The Paris clearances, like some in the over-peopled 
districts of Ireland and the Highlands, have no doubt 
been too sudden and sweeping; yet in the end the work- 
ing classes, being forced to extend themselves over a 
larger surface, will benefit by the change. The fire 
which, two centuries ago, laid whole streets of London 
in ashes, became in the course of time a permanent 
benefit to the city ; and even meanwhile, the " ouvriers " 
find one thing set against another, and suffer less from 
these changes than some other classes of society. 
Masons, carpenters, plasterers, plumbers, and others 
connected with their trades, have been kept in constant 
employment ; and receiving high wages, with abundance 
of work, they have suffered less than many who have 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 67 

drawn no direct benefit from these alterations, and yet, 
in consequence of the scarcity of house accommodation, 
have had house rents raised on them to an enormous 
amount. We resided, for instance, in a " pension," or 
boarding-house, which consisted of three public rooms, a 
kitchen, and some eighteen bedrooms, most of them 
very small. Though situated in a centrical part of the 
town, it stood in a plain court, off a very common street; 
yet for this tenement the master of our *' pension " paid 
500Z. sterling ; nor did this large sum include a load of 
taxes, raised in proportion to the rent, and payable to 
the government and municipal authorities. The people 
of Paris grow restive under their burdens. They are 
finding out that the magnificent and costly improvements 
which the government plans and the municipality executes 
they have in the end to pay for. Shopkeepers, and those 
who have hotels and pensions, complain that the English 
are scared from Paris by the excessively high rates to 
which everything has risen ; and that, finding railways 
open a way southward, they have carried themselves and 
their money elsewhere. 

In connection with these improvements of Paris, a 
more serious than any pecuniary evil lies before France — 
like a rock ahead. The government meanwhile keep the 
workmen of Temple and St. Antoine quiet and peaceful. 
They get high wages and constant employment, and so 
are tranquil — no proverb more true than this, "It is a 
hungry man that is an angry one." Working men, when 
they have plenty to eat and drink, have no appetite for 
revolutions. But in France, and elsewhere, thoughtfiil 

F 2 



68 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

men are looking forward to a time, perhaps not very 
distant, when the funds required for carrying out these 
improvements shall be exhausted ; or rather, when the 
debt they entail becomes insupportable. They are ask- 
ing themselves, What then 1 Temple and St. Antoine 
must have bread. " Bread or blood ! " is no new cry in 
Paris ; and, clever as the nephew is, Louis Napoleon has 
small chance of such success as attended his great uncle 
when he scattered a formidable mob, not by his bayonets, 
but by his wit. Then an officer of the Government of 
the Revolution, the first Napoleon had been ordered out 
to disperse a body of rioters. Having drawn up his 
soldiers and some guns across the street, he waited their 
advance. They at length appeared, sweeping down on 
him and his party like a roaring torrent. The artillery- 
men, with their port-fires, stood ready at his signal to 
pour showers of grape into the body of the mob. Un- 
willing to shed blood, he stepped out from his men to 
reason with the suffering and misguided people, and soon 
found himself vis-a-vis with their head — a virago of a 
woman, whose appearance presented a remarkable con- 
trast to his own. She was of great size, and enormously 
fat j while he, always very little, was at that time so thin, 
as well as small, that he was known by the sobriquet of 
" Le Petit Caporal." He remonstrated with this lady ; 
but she replied with volleys of abuse — telling him that 
while she and other honest, hard-working people were 
starving, such idle fellows as he and his soldiers were 
fattening on the best of the land. With that eagle eye 
and remarkable promptitude which afterwards turned the 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 



fate of many a battle-field, Napoleon saw at once the 
weak point of his adversary's position. He paused till 
she was out of breath. Then taking off his hat, he bowed 
to the mob ; and, placing his own thin figure beside that 
of his fat opponent, he asked them to say, whether the 
good lady or he looked most like starving ? As happens 
in more respectable assemblies than mobs, and elsewhere 
than in witty France, a good-humoured joke won the 
da^ j and the people, for the time at least, quietly dis- 
persed. A piece of rare good fortune, such as the 
chapter of accidents seldom turns up ! 

Napoleon III. is said to trust to other means than this 
of keeping down a people who, little restrained by moral 
or religious principles, are the immediate descendants of 
such as were familiar with revolutions — with building 
barricades and overturning thrones. We dread a time 
of suffering overtaking the " ouvrier " of Paris. It will 
certainly not be met with the calm, and noble, and in so 
many instances Christian, patience of our Lancashire 
cotton-weavers. The spirit of revolution in France is 
not dead, but sleepeth; and what there are spirits in 
Paris prepared to dare and do, flashed out in the terrible 
reply of one of them. Being told that, ill-furnished with 
arms, and exposed to cannonade and fusillade in the 
now spacious streets, their power of revolution was gone, 
he smiled grimly ; and alluding at once to the numbers 
of the working classes, and the terrible means which, if 
roused, they were prepared to adopt, said, " We have 
two hundred thousand lucifer matches ! " After the hor- 
rors of the. first revolution, unparalleled in history, it 



70 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

were hard to say to what means the lower classes of 
Paris, led on by wicked men, would not resort — setting at 
nought all the precautions which the Emperor has taken 
to secure the peace of the capital and the preservation 
of his throne. He has taken every possible precaution ; 
and indeed it is whispered that he had other ends in 
view in improving Paris, than merely the beauty and 
health of the city. Clearing out the dense parts, and 
widening the streets, he has laid it open to be easily 
swept, in the case of an hieute, by charges of cavalry 
and discharges of artillery ; nor, it is said, has he removed 
the old paving stones from the streets to cover them 
with broken metal, so much to deaden the rumbling 
noise of carriages, as to prevent the mob finding in them 
the best materials for barricades — ramparts which, as in 
a street fight, put an undisciplined multitude on a par 
with regular troops. Deep as Napoleon is, these whis- 
perings and suspicions give him credit for more depth 
than perhaps he could justly claim. We greatly fear 
that his wisest precautions would go for nothing, were a 
stagnation of work to throw the Parisian " ouvriers " out 
of bread. The ancient noblesse, as did the old ad- 
herents of the Stuart dynasty in our own country, dwell 
apart in their chateaux; and though they gi-owl and 
grumble at the present order of things, they have little 
power to subvert it. But, unfortunately for the Emperor, 
the intellectual, and therefore influential, classes of Paris 
are not attached to his government; the shopkeepers, 
who care more for their profits than for either politics oi 
religion, would, in case of a disturbance, close their doors 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 7I 

and quietly wait the result behind their shutters; and 
although the Emperor could bring parks of artillery and 
pour regiments of soldiers into the streets, the French 
army might prove in his, what it has been in other hands, 
" a deceitful bow." Such are the lessons of experience. 
Closely connected with the people, and forced into the 
army through the system of conscription, the French 
soldier is not much to be depended on in any conflict 
between the government and the people. 

But leaving these speculations, and the future of France 
to Him who " maketh the wrath of man to praise Him, 
and restraineth the remainder of wrath," let us turn to 
some of those aspects of Paris which distinguish its 
streets more even than their architecture. In regard to 
some of these, it were well we imitated what we cannot 
but admire. Paris has other things besides her fashions 
which we would do well to copy; and we might with 
advantage engraft on our free institutions a little of the 
vigour of her despotism. 

I St. — The streets are remarkable for their cleanliness. 
A host of scavengers, who work through the night or at 
early day, present the fair city to its inhabitants every 
morning trim and in perfect order. I observed here, as 
in other towns of France, and in some of Switzerland, a 
practice which contributes much to their comfort and 
cleanliness. It is one which our municipal authorities at 
home might think of. From time to time water is turned 
into all the gutters, where it runs in a full stream, bearing 
off to undergi-Qund sewers the straws, dust, or ashes that 
are swept into it On looking out shortly after break of 



7* THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

day, I used to see men sweeping the court in which we 
dwelt with as much care as if it had been a house-floor ; 
and it was both amusing and pleasant to see how the 
national politeness of a Frenchman would break out 
through his humble occupation — the sweeper stopping 
to lift his cap to a female acquaintance, not a whit higher 
in rank than himself, as she returned from the baker's 
carrying a piece of bread, like a paling stake, or went, 
with prayer-book or beads in hand, to early mass. This 
circumstance may be taken as an example of the respect 
which Frenchmen pay to woman, however humble — a 
fine feature of their national character. No Frenchman 
will either enter or leave a railway carriage where there 
are ladies without raising his hat; nor does he ever 
address, but with some mark of respect, the humblest 
domestic, or keeper of a stall or shop. In this country 
it is not rank only to which expressions of honour are 
paid. The high bear themselves politely even to the 
humble ; and were that as much the rule at home as it 
is here, we should have less occasion to complain of the 
rudeness and coarse manners of our populace; for the 
world is a mirror which smiles on you if you meet it 
with smiles, and looks rudely on such as look rudely 
on it 

Nor, to return to the streets of Paris, are good order 
and cleanliness less apparent in the poorest than in the 
best streets of the city. Not that the former are or can 
be in such perfect order ; yet in them we observed little 
corresponding to the foul condition of our city alleys, 
coiirtSj or closes. It was a contrast, not a conespon- 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 73 

dence. It humbled our national vanity \ and made us 
regret that free institutions, our popular election of town 
councillors and police commissioners, should result in 
less care being taken for the health and comfort and 
decent habits of the poor than under a despotic regime. 
By allowing such offices to be filled with inferior and 
inefficient men, or by niggardly grudging vigorous officials 
the funds, or, from petty jealousy, the powers necessary 
for making our towns decent and salubrious, we injure 
the cause of true liberty, and make it stink in the nostrils 
of mankind. It should not be so. Yet we could not 
shut our eyes to the fact that some things are managed 
better under a despotic than under a free government; 
and that in fine parks for their health and recreation, in 
public exhibitions for their amusement and instruction, 
and in many municipal provisions for their comfort and 
cleanliness, the poor and working classes are better cared 
for here than at home. 

Connected with this aspect of its streets, I observed 
that Paris had a class of men whose trade corresponds to 
one pursued at home — at least in Edinburgh. 

Who walks by night or early mom the streets of our 
northern metropolis, may see, in wretched-looking girls 
or ragged old women, a hideous race who pass from one 
dust-heap to another to rake them with a knife and pick up 
such cinders, potatoes, bits of paper, or scraps of meat as lie 
among the ashes. From their dens of filth and darkness 
and drunkenness, which I have often visited, they issue 
forth, like hags of night, to find the means of prolonging 
a life of hunger, cold, ignorance, vice, and degradation. 



74 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

Paris has a corresponding class ; but, though among the 
lowest and wildest of the people, they look wonderfully 
respectable. The chiffoniiiers^ as they are called, are 
men. They are not clothed in rags — in Paris nobody is. 
In one hand they carry a lantern, and in the other a 
stick armed with a hook, which, as they pass from one 
dust-heap to another, they use with remarkable dexterity ; 
transfixing rags, paper, offal, anything that may be turned 
into money — as fast as a heron does a trout — to transport 
it with a jerk into the wicker basket on their back. In 
this, as in many things else besides their celebrated 
cookery, the French, who maugre their faults are patterns 
of industry and economy, set us an excellent example. 
They turn everything to account. 

2nd. — ^Another notable feature of the streets of Paris 
is the absence of abject poverty and wretchedness. 

When King George — not of blessed memory — ^visited 
Edinburgh, he asked, it is said, on casting his eyes over 
the well-conditioned and well-attired thousands who 
thronged the streets to see a live king, " Where are the 
poor ? " If by that term we understand the class who 
with unwashed faces, tangled hair, emaciated forms, and 
ragged attire swarm in certain districts of our large towns, 
the question may be justly asked of Paris. In London, 
Liverpool, Edinburgh, and Glasgow, your steps, unless 
they are confined to the most fashionable streets, are 
ever and anon crossed by some human creature who is 
the picture of misery; and with swarms of half-naked 
children, women clad in scanty rags, men crushed in 
heart and clad in seedy black, and, most painful sight oj 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 75 

all, sallow, sickly, skinny infants, whose weary heads lie 
on the shoulders of hags that carry horrid oaths on their 
tongue and the fire of whisky in their eye, these cities 
have large districts through which it almost breaks one's 
heart to walk. Now the remarkable absence of such 
sights in its streets, seems to me the best sight in Paris. 
The Louvre with its magnificent galleries of pictures and 
statues, the Champs Elysees or gardens of the Tuileries 
and Luxembourg, where, all arranged with exquisite taste, 
lines of beautiful trees afford a grateful shade, white 
marble statues gleam amid the green foliage, and foun- 
tains of costly materials and graceful forms send forth 
their murmur and throw up to the bright sunshine 
showers of liquid diamonds, yielded me no pleasure 
equal to that of walking among the homes of the hum- 
blest classes. I saw no broken-hearted woman, no pining 
child, no skeleton infant to whom life was a misfortune, 
and the grave would be a welcome refuge. 

Mendicancy there, begging by man, woman, or child, 
is suppressed, I may remark, with the vigour of the 
French police. Still I thought it possible that, though 
no ragged objects were prowling about the fashionable 
or busy parts of the town, the faubourgs of the working 
classes, and those old and very poor streets which lie 
under the shadow of its Cathedral towers, might show a 
display of rags and wretchedness corresponding to our 
own. To settle this question, we went away on a voyage 
of discovery ; making for the densely peopled quarters of 
the Isle de la Cite, — the Paris of the Romans — where, 
as in most other capital and cathedral towns, the Courts 



76 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

of Justice stand among those who are most amenable to 
their laws, and the degraded and godless habits of the 
people may have given birth to the saying, " The nearer 
the church the farther from grace." The houses there 
are of great height, and look as old as the grey towers of 
Notre Dame ; the streets, which are very narrow, are in- 
tersected by lanes or alleys, not unlike our Edinburgh 
closes. Some of the trades the inhabitants pursue are 
foul, and all of them are of the humblest kind. If the 
men were not ruffians, many looked like roughs ; indeed, 
so dark and sombre were these alleys, and so forbidding 
the appearance of their inhabitants, that the ladies of our 
party could hardly muster courage to accompany us as, 
long familiar with worse scenes at home, we pushed 
along. It is an act of justice to the lowest of these 
French people to say that all our questions were cour- 
teously answered — their national politeness blooming 
there like a flower among ruins. We encountered neither 
injury nor insult. Now here are the statistics of our 
voyage as noted down on returning to our " pension " : — 
" Saw but one dirty woman ; saw but one man in ragged 
attire ; saw no child without shoes to its feet or with a 
torn dress on its back ; saw no sickly nursling in the 
arms of such mothers as disgrace our St. Giles', Cowgates, 
and Gallowgates at home." An extraordinary record ! 
To many it may seem incredible, yet it is an exact copy 
of our notes ; and sets forth the plain, unvarnished facts 
of the case. Boast as we may, on the one hand, of our 
Sabbaths, our pure faith, our superior and more general 
piety, and charge Paris as we may on the other with its 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. ff 

bloody revolutions, its infidelity and its vices ; alas, for 
us ! it contrasts, not compares, with our large cities by 
an almost entire absence in its streets of that abject 
poverty and extreme wretchedness, of that wreck of 
human happiness and hearts before which Philanthropy 
at home stands aghast, and almost helpless. 

Now to me, this the most pleasant, was the most 
puzzling feature of Paris. Not to gratify an idle curiosity, 
but in the hope that the investigation might suggest some 
useful lessons to ourselves, I made many inquiries to find 
a key to it ; and it would appear that, with much poverty 
and wretchedness, no doubt, within its walls, the compa- 
ratively happy state of Paris, like the unhappy one of 
Ireland, which some refer to the prevalence of popery, 
others to the presence of the Saxon, others to the practice 
of absenteeism, and others still to other things, is due 
not to one, but to a number of causes. The account of 
these, with other matters, must be reserved for the next 
paper. 

This only meanwhile I may say, that though, as I shall 
show, the Roman Catholic Order of Sisters of Charity 
have their share in the good work, the cause of this 
happy state of matters is not to be found in popery and 
the priests. With the mass of the people the priests 
have no influence whatever — a condition of things with 
which infidelity has something, but politics still more, to 
do. We are not to conclude that the Parisian ouvriers 
are, like many of the upper classes, cold, confirmed 
sceptics. Numbers have, though dim and imperfect, 
some faith in the divine authority of the Bible and in the 



lS THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

mission of our Saviour — only they do not believe in 
popery ; nor regard its priests as other than the tools of 
despotism and the enemies of the liberties of France. 
They have not forgotten, nor ever will forget, how these 
came forth with stole, and crosses, and holy water to 
bless the trees of liberty which France had watered with 
her blood ; but no sooner saw it to their own advantage 
and that of their pliant but ambitious church to pursue a 
different poHcy, than they abandoned, if they did not 
betray, the cause of freedom. When the poor workman, 
in articulo mortis^ lies indifferent to all around him, his 
wife or some neighbour may fetch a priest from the 
church — ^which he has never entered — v/ith his holy oil to 
administer extreme unction ; and, so be that the fees are 
paid, the rights of the dead may be administered to his 
body, and masses said for his soul. But, however he 
may die or descend into the grave, he lived to laugh at 
the Church of Rome, to treat her ordinances with con- 
tempt, and look on her priests with suspicion. In illus- 
tration of this, let me relate a fact told to me by one of 
the city missionaries. One day he entered a room where 
a tailor, seated on his board, pursued his occupation — 
talking the while to his wife, who employed herself in 
household affairs, with a tongue that went as fast as his 
needle. So soon as his eye fell on the missionary his 
vivacity was gone ; he coldly returned the other's salu- 
tation ; while his spouse moved stealthily about the 
room like a cat, eyeing the stranger with sulky and 
suspicious looks. There was something wrong. My 
acquaintance tried, but in vain, to thaw the ice ; and 



THE STREETS OF PAKIS. 79 

was about to withdraw in despair, when he happened to 
m^ke it known that he was a Protestant missionary. 
Eh Hen! In an instant the cloud passed from the 
tailor's face ; and, dropping the needle to stretch out 
his hand and give the other a hearty welcome, he ex- 
claimed, " Why did you not tell us so when you came 
in? — ^we took you for a Jesuit, or some agent of the 
priests." The truth is, that the Roman CathoHc Church 
in France, though retaining influence enough to trample 
somewhat on the rights of Protestants and obstruct the 
progress of truth, though not powerless for evil, is in a 
large measure powerless for good — even such good as 
good men in her aim at, and might in other circum- 
stances do. In proof of that, let me produce a high 
authority. I refer to a very distinguished man, Rosseau 
St. Hilaire, a professor of the University of Paris, and 
one of the best and greatest men whom I have ever had 
the honour and happiness to know. Speaking of the 
Protestant Church of France, he says : — " In a religious 
point of view, though we have little hold of the peasant, 
we have some over the soldier. Those drawn from the 
country districts, on coming to our cities, bring with 
them, in simplicity and ingenuousness, virtues unknown 
to our workmen. All is new to them in the town, and 
it is not always its vices which they learn. Some have 
there become acquainted with a Gospel of which they 
had never heard in their hamlets. The discipline of our 
Church pleases them; within her they find themselves 
in their element. Let those bear witness who are seek- 
ing to bring them under the power of the Gospel. When 



80 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

ready to embark for the Crimea, or for China, when face 
to face with the ships which were to carry them away, at 
the sad thought of a departure which might never have a 
return, have they ever been seen to trample on the Gospel 
which others offered them? No doubt some of the 
grains of precious seed have been trampled under foot 
or choked by thorns ; but in proof that others have ger- 
minated, I appeal to those good brave men belonging to 
the army whom we are so happy to meet in our churches. 
There they are, brave men. Who does not know that it 
requires more courage to withstand the raillery of their 
comrades than to take a battery by assault 1 Nor are 
they, I am sure, worse soldiers, because, by the side of 
the flag of France, they dare to raise that of Jesus Christ. 
But it may be asked, does not the powerful organisation 
of Catholicism, which wraps round men of all ages and 
all conditions, exercise no influence on the people of our 
country districts ? Will not birth, death, disease, have a 
powerful influence in bringing back to the priest those 
who have escaped from him ? In short, and taking 
France as a whole, we do not hesitate to reply, No ! 
The sale of the property of the clergy, nearly all acquired 
by the rural population, has made a wide breach between 
the priest and the peasant. Indeed, the evil is of older 
date. The Romish Church, in putting a price on the 
sacraments of the Church, and forcing the poor country 
curSs (clergy) to draw a part of their small stipends from 
ill-disposed or insolvent debtors, has perverted all their 
relations with their flocks. If, here and there^ in Frame 
Catholicism has retained an actual influence^ it is over 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. Si 

women ; over men it has almost none. We do not deny 
that in such and such a district it has preserved its power 
through the influence of exceptional circumstances ; but 
at an average, so to speak, even when it wishes the real 
good of men, and it wishes many things else besides, 
^Le Caiholidsmc est im^uissant^ — Popery is powerless'' 




THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

II. 

N the spring of 1827, we saw the Carnival at Paris. 
Its scenes of fun, feasting, dancing, and delirious 
merriment usher in Lent, or the Care?ne, as it is 
called in France ; when, to commemorate the forty days 
which our Lord spent in the wilderness, " being an hun- 
gered," every pious Catholic is supposed to live on fish and 
soupe maigre, — not that the rules of the Church on abstain- 
ing from the use of animal food are nowadays generally 
observed. Even at Quimper, the capital of the depart- 
ment of Finisterre, which is one of the most Popish dis- 
tricts in France, we remarked that the "bons catho- 
liques" were few; most of the company at the table 
d^hote eating as heartily of flesh meat as we heretics did. 
Indeed, we might have forgotten Lent altogether, but 
that on its one or two last days we had to content our- 
selves with fish. This proved no great hardship ; the 
dressing was so excellent, and the variety so great Oys- 
ters in the shell led the van; the second course consisted 
of mussels, in the shell also ; then came sardines ; then 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 8$ 

whiting ; then flounders ; then cod, or what the Scotch 
people call hardfish ; then soles j then mullet ; then 
pike j then skate ; eels, swimming in oil, bringing up the 
rear. Such is Lent ! What a farce ! 

To fortify themselves for this period of mortification to 
the flesh, the Carnival, of which I was speaking, is a day 
devoted to indulgence — eating, drinking, dancing, making 
merry, without having, for they do not even fast now, the 
excuse of those of old who said " let us eat and drink, 
for to-morrow we die." One of the amusements of an 
institution which belongs to Roman Catholic countries, 
and which the Statistigues de la France for 1863, at page 30, 
prove to have a most pernicious influence on the morals 
of the country, consists in men and women putting on 
masks, and walking the streets in these, as well as en- 
gaging in all the fun and follies of the day. While some 
are content with a simple black domino, others dress 
like Turks, or Tartars ; some carry enormous humps on 
their backs ; others show noses nearly a foot long ; in 
short, all manner of odd and grotesque forms parade the 
streets to their own, and the public, amusement. I re- 
member one figure at the Carnival in 1827, which puzzled 
the Parisians and greatly amused them by its drollery. 
It was a person seated on a donkey — presenting, as it 
advanced, the form, features, and dress of a beautiful 
woman ; but appearing, when it had passed, a man as 
ugly as the other was pretty. It was impossible to tell 
whether a man or a woman bestrode that donkey. One 
face was certainly a mask, but the imitation was so 
clever, that the spectator could not discover which was the 

o s 



S4 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

true and which the false face — all the more, that the 
figure kept constantly turning from side to side, a sort of 
representation in one person of " Beauty and the Beast." 
More than the shield of the old legend which in its two 
faces, one of gold and the other of silver, presented 
points of comparison rather than of contrast, this figure 
of the Carnival, in one aspect so attractive but in another 
so ugly, may be taken as a symbol of Paris, France, and 
the French. They present strong points of contrast. In 
some respects the French are very loveable, presenting a 
character and disposition which win our esteem; in 
others they are so much the reverse, that we have been 
sometimes tempted to wish, lest the contamination of 
their habits should be carried into society at home, that 
the sea which rolled between us and them were a gulf 
impassable. Were we writing for our neighbours across 
the Channel, it might be our duty to direct attention to 
what was defective in their morals and manners ; but as, 
apart from the meanness of abusing the absent, it will be 
most profitable to ourselves to dwell on those features of 
the French and of their capital which we would do well 
to imitate, I resume the subject of my last paper. 

I have shown how Paris presented a notable and ad- 
mirable contrast to our own large cities in the absence 
from its streets of abject poverty and wretchedness. I 
now proceed to relate the causes, so far as I could ascer- 
tain them, of this very pleasant and happy state of matters. 
In doing so, may I hope to suggest something of practical 
usefulness to those Christians and philanthropists at home 
who " sigh and cry over the abominations of the land V 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 85 

First. One reason given to us by very intelligent 
Frenchmen for less abject poverty and wretchedness in 
their country than in ours was, that through the operation 
of the French law, wealth and the comforts of life were 
more equally distributed in France than in Great Britain. 
That my readers may be able to judge for themselves 
what weight there lies in this, let me explain the diffe- 
rence between the law of France and that of our country 
in regard to the disposal of property. In the case of 
entailed estates — though the law has been modified, and, 
I will add, mollified of late — the whole landed property 
with us passes into the hands of the eldest son ; and so 
the other members of the family, who have been reared 
in luxurious habits, and never taught to earn their bread, 
may be left without a penny. An equally unfortunate 
result follows in all cases where a man whose wealth lies 
in land, or heritable estate, dies intestate, leaving no 
will. Now in France the law, which approaches to what 
is called the udal^ in opposition to the feudal, system, is 
quite different. It even interferes with what might be 
reckoned man's rightful liberty, in so far as it dictates to 
him the manner in which, to a large extent, he is to dis- 
pose of his property by will. He may indeed dispose of 
a fourth of it according to his own pleasure \ that share 
he may bequeath to any one member of his family in 
preference to the rest, or even to a stranger ; but the re- 
mainder, the other three-fourths, must be equally divided 
among his children, without distinction of son or daughter, 
eldest or youngest child. Now, whatever may be said 
for or against this law, its effect is certainly to produce a 



86 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

more equal diffusion of property ; and to prevent that 
enormous accumulation of wealth in the hands of a com- 
paratively small number of individuals, by the side ot 
which, as if it were its shadow, great poverty is always 
found. Usually, the one bears a remarkable relation to 
the other; and just as the brighter the sunlight, the 
blacker the shadow, so, attempt to explain or remedy it 
as you may, the greater the wealth of some in any com- 
munity, the greater the poverty of others. It seems, to 
borrow an illustration from the " gentle art," to be with 
men as with fishes ; for I have observed that in those 
lochs where the sa/mo ferox is found, the trouts, though 
numerous, are usually small ; and so it is equally certain, 
say Frenchmen, that where the law or customs of a 
country encourage large accumulations, rather than the 
general distribution, of property, great poverty will always 
be found. In France, wealth is more equally distributed 
than in Great Britain, and therefore, they say, there is 
much less, either in appearance or reality, of abject 
misery and wretchedness with them than with ourselves. 
Second. The remarkable appearance of decency and 
comfort presented by the humblest classes in Paris as 
compared with the same class among ourselves, is in my 
opinion, and in that of most intelligent Frenchmen, to be 
chiefly attributed to the greater sobriety of the French 
people. Looking to Ireland, to the Roman Catholic 
cantons of Switzerland, to the swarms of mendicants that 
infest the streets of Naples and Rome, or here to Quim- 
per, the capital, as I have said, of the most Popish de- 
partment of France, where beggars, thick as blackberries, 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 87 



are squatting in rows at the doors of the cathedral, and 
hunting one through the streets, it would appear that 
rags and Romanism, Popery and pauperism go together. 
But the connection between drinking and destitution is 
more certain still; and to the comparative absence of the 
first we are to attribute the comparative absence of the 
second in the streets of Paris. The fortnight we spent 
there on our way to Brittany often found us in the poorer 
parts of the city ; yet there, save in three cases, we never 
saw man or woman under the influence of drink — a 
happy state of matters, and one which exactly corre- 
sponds with all my former observations of a city which I 
have repeatedly visited, and where I once spent five or 
six months of my student life. In the heat of their 
opposition to the bill by which Mr. Gladstone (much to 
his honour) sought, among other reasons for its introduc- 
tion, to change the habits of our country from potations 
of fiery spirits to the use of light French wines, some of 
my associates in the Total Abstinence cause seemed to 
think that I had, on former occasions, painted a too 
glowing picture of the sobriety of Paris and of the 
French. I was therefore the more careful at this visit to 
observe the true state of matters ; and I repeat the state- 
ment, that with the exception mentioned, and that also, 
perhaps, of some young conscripts on a balloting day at 
the Hotel de Ville, in the whole fortnight we spent in 
Paris, we, though often passing through the poorest as 
well as finest parts of the city, never saw more than three 
persons drunk. The vice of drunkenness, besides many 
other vices, is, no doubt, to be found in Paris, still the 



88 THE STREETS OF PARIS, 

fact of its being so seldom seen in her streets demon* 
strates that it exists to a much less extent among the 
French poor and working classes than among our own. 
Other vices, concealed under the mask of virtues, may 
impose on us — hypocrisy passing itself off for piety; 
superstition for devotion ; falsehood for truth ; and the 
grossest licentiousness, shining with French polish, for 
gallantry and politeness. The strictness of police laws 
may preserve the streets from the obtrusive appearance 
of other forms of vice, but neither gendarme^ nor sergent 
de ville, nor policeman, whether armed with the French 
sword or the English baton, can make a drunk man arti 
culate, or walk, or look so as to pass for a total abstainer. 
Drunkenness is like the ointment in the right hand which 
betrayeth itself; and in the case of a community where 
it does not make much appearance, we are entitled to 
infer that it has not much existence. But not content 
with my own observations and the conclusions to which 
they led, I made this matter one of special inquiry in 
conversing with city missionaries, and others well ac- 
quainted with the habits and homes of the poorer classes. 
While freely and frankly acknowledging their irreligion and 
ungodliness, and such habits of vice as they were addicted 
to, they all bore testimony to their comparative sobriety ; 
and to that virtue, chiefly, they attributed the absence of 
that abject poverty and utter wretchedness which, in 
happy contrast with our cities, characterises the streets of 
Paris. I give the very words of one with whom I passed 
a few pleasant hours in visiting the families of his district 
—some being converts to Protestantism, others still, at 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 89 

least in name, Roman Catholics. — Monsieur Durro said: 
" Save among the chiffonniers^'' the most degraded class in 
Paris, " a drunken man is seldom seen ; and a drunken 
woman, almost never." 

From my knowledge of the state and habits of our 
lapsed and degraded classes, among whom I have spent 
years of labour, I am certain that the theory of the 
French is correct. Drinking habits are the curse of our 
people; and whether Christians and philanthropists at 
home are, or are not, prepared, with the view of saving 
men and women both for this world and the next, to join 
with me and others the Total Abstinence cause, surely 
religion and humanity call on them to lay the axe to the 
root of this enormous evil j and for that end to use all 
such means as wisdom dictates, and conscience approves. 
How drunkenness emasculates our power as well as dis~ 
graces our character, was oddly yet pithily expressed by 
the Frenchman, who said that he thanked God that we 
Anglo-Saxons were a drunken race ; for, said he, had it 
been otherwise, you would have conquered the world. 

Third. It were injustice to the Frenchwoman not to 
state that to her is due a considerable measure ol that 
absence of wretchedness and poverty which characterises 
the streets of Paris. Call her, if you choose, and as 
some do, frivolous, or as others, deceitful, she has a taste 
and sense of propriety which would make her ashamed 
to show herself with an unwashed face, or send forth her 
husband or children with a rag on their backs or a hole 
in their dress. In Paris and elsewhere you may see 
people with mended, but none with ragged clothes; so 



90 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

that until we came to Brittany, where the people are as 
remarkable for their Popish bigotry, and deep drinking, 
and dreadful swearing, as for their antique and pictur- 
esque costumes, we almost never saw a Frenchwoman 
with a rag on her back or a spot on her face j and even 
here, the women, speaking of them generally, as they ply 
the distaff, while they tend their cows in the field, or 
walk the roads knitting, or sit at their windows sewing, 
ehew a tidiness that is as remarkable as their industry. 
In fact, for neatness of attire, respect for personal appear- 
ance both in herself and in her family, and habits of indus- 
try, the Frenchwoman is a pattern to the world. Scarcely 
ever do you find them what the Scotch people call hand- 
idle ; and slatterns never. The girl who keeps a shop is 
busy with some piece of work when customers do not 
require her attention. The woman who sits by her stall 
on the open street, with her feet on a box of lighted 
charcoal to keep them warm, is usually sewing or knit- 
ting ; and only lifts her head from her work to say, when 
she becomes aware of your presence. Que voulez-vous, 
monsieur'^ And but yesterday, in walking through the 
weekly market at Quimper, where the Breton women sat 
all tidily attired, with towers and wings of snowy linen 
on their heads, and on a table before them the produce 
of their dairy in curiously carved pats and pillars of first- 
rate butter, I was greatly struck with the spectacle of 
industry which the scene presented. Hardly one not 
engaged with a customer but was busy with wire or 
needle — a lively as well as pleasant spectacle, for their 
tongues went as fast as their tools. I have seen in the 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 9I 

humble homes of our own country how a taste for tidi- 
ness and habits of industry will throw over poverty itself 
a decent appearance ; and characterised as the French- 
woman is by these, to her may be in some measure attri- 
buted that happy absence of the appearance of extreme 
and abject wretchedness which distinguishes the streets 
of Paris. 

We boast of our superior virtues, but there are minor 
virtues in regard to which we would do well to take a 
lesson from France. It is nothing to the purpose to say 
that the respect which is paid to the personal, outward 
appearance here, is but the whitewashing of a sepulchre ; 
the embroidered pall which covers the coffin and cor- 
ruption. Whatever immorality may lie concealed in 
France under the appearance of outward decency — nor 
do I deny its existence, although, according to the 
Scotch proverb, " 111 doers are ill dreaders," I believe it 
has often been greatly exaggerated — the immorality in 
France is certainly not owing to those habits of industry 
and to that taste for personal decency which eminently 
and honourably characterise its women. Any way, why 
should an abhorrence of rags and dirt, why should a 
taste for neat attire, why should clean hands and face not 
be associated with the highest Christi^jn virtues ? These 
simple and attractive graces are not vice ; and so far is 
the absence of them from being a proof of piety, that it 
is a. blot on it. The body is the temple of the Holy 
Ghost; and experience proves, as the old divine said, 
that holiness and cleanliness are nearly allied — a remark 
which owes its triteness to its truth. Who has not, or 



g2 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

may not have observed, that chimney-sweeps, colliers, 
forgemen, glass-blowers, and others whose occupation 
is incompatible with personal cleanliness, are apt, unless 
where God's grace or good training exerts a counteract- 
ing influence, to lose respect for themselves and sink 
into degraded habits. I know that virtue and genuine 
piety may be found under a most ungraceful exterior, 
as a pearl in its dark, foul shell ; but the gem is best set 
off in a ring of gold. And he is the truest friend of virtue 
who associates, and seeks to associate, the graces of re- 
ligion with those of nature. Thus we adorn the doctrine 
of God our Saviour, and give heed to the Apostle's warn- 
ing, " take care that your good be not evil spoken of." 

Fourth. Not the least important cause of the absence 
of abject poverty and wretchedness in the streets of 
Paris, is to be found in their method of managing the 
affairs of the poor. They have nothing that can properly 
be called a Poor Rate, or Poor Law. In France, none 
are entitled to claim relief as a right; nor, as with us, are 
the funds which go to meet the wants of poverty, either 
raised by compulsory assessment, or distributed by the 
hands of mere officials. What is true of Paris, applies 
equally to the whole kingdom. From the funds of the 
different Departments into which the country is divided, 
Government contributes about half the sum required to 
meet the wants of the poor; the other half is raised by 
the voluntary contributions of the people. So the French 
are not encouraged in habits of indolence, and improvi- 
dence, and dependence, by feeling, as our people do, 
that however they may waste their time and money, they 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. ^J 



have a certain fund to fall back on for support, and as 
good a legal right to the gains of other men's industry as 
a proprietor to the rents of his estate. The Poor Law- 
system, as imported very much from England, and 
wrought now in Scotland, is working sad havoc on those 
domestic affections, and that self-respect and independ- 
ence, for which our humblest Scotch people were once 
distinguished. In their unwillingness to become paupers, 
in the shame they felt to eat the bread that was not wet with 
the sweat of their brow, and in the hardships which sons 
and daughters endured rather than have the parents they 
revered receive a penny from the poor fund, our people 
nobly illustrated the contemptuous adage of " Scotch 
pride and Scotch poverty." I believe the country, and 
the poor themselves, would be much happier without a 
Poor Law. Under its operation the pride which ennobled 
the poverty is gone ; and the poverty has increased, is 
increasing, and, unless a remedy is applied, will increase. 
We regret this, not so much on account of the burdens 
which indolence imposes on industry, as on account of 
its degrading and demoralising effect on the character of 
our people. It is loosening the ties by which God binds 
parent to child and child to parent, and destroying those 
sacred affections which, next to the fear and love of God 
himself, are the very salt and salvation of society. The 
poor themselves will be the heaviest sufferers in the long 
run j Poor Law Union Workhouses, these great and 
gloomy prisons, are already rising throughout the country 
to check the evils of the existing system — cold and miser- 
able refuges for such as in former and better days spent 



94 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

the evening of life by the warm fireside of a son or 
daughter, who, revering their grey hairs, and tenderly 
ministering to their wants, supported, as nature dictates, 
and the law of God requires, those in feeble old age, 
who, in their helpless infancy, had supported them. 

But the most potent element for good in the manage- 
ment of the poor, as conducted in Paris, and generally 
throughout France, lies in the manner in which the funds 
are distributed. This is not the work of mere paid offi- 
cials, or of Boards, who perhaps consider their duty dis- 
charged when they have raised their funds by a compulsory 
taxation, and spent them by the hands of their officers. 
The system which is practised in Paris, with such happy 
results, is, in spirit and genius, the same as that which, in 
opposition to a Poor Law, was advocated by Dr. Chal- 
mers ; and which, so long as he remained in Glasgow as 
minister in the parish of St. John's, he carried out, with 
triumphant success. The funds applicable to the case of 
the poor in Paris — as well that part which is contributed 
by the Government, as that which is raised by voluntary 
contributions — reach them through the hands of volun- 
tary and Christian agents. These, with a kindness and 
philanthropy worthy of the highest praise, devote them- 
selves in the wards of hospitals and amid the dwellings 
of the poor, to the alleviation of suffering and the supply 
of want — to raise the fallen, to reclaim the vicious, to 
heal the sick, to feed the hungry, and to clothe the 
naked. These are the ScKurs de Charity, or Sisters of 
Mercy, as they are called. They belong to the Roman 
Catholic Church. There are different orders of them, 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 95 

indicated by their different dresses — almost all unbecom- 
ing, and fitted, if not intended, to extirpate any root of 
vanity remaining in woman's heart. They wear cross and 
beads; and are usually, I believe, to employ the ex- 
pression of an Irishwoman, "hot Catholics." But it 
were a bigotry as blind as Popery itself, not to see and 
honour their merits ; and be ready also, within certain 
limits, to follow their laudable example. I have not had 
an opportunity of seeing how they conduct themselves 
in the houses of the poor ; but when, as an amateur stu- 
dent, I walked the hospitals of Paris, I used to admire 
the motherly kindness of these excellent nurses. I abhor 
Popery as much as any man ; but he ought to abhor 
himself who could shut his eyes to the useful labours and 
estimable properties of women, who, though Papists, out 
of love to God and suffering humanity, withdraw from 
the comforts of home and the gaieties of the world to 
spend their days and nights in the presence of disease 
and death; to brave the dangers and endure the horrors 
of an hospital. It is by the hands of this class that the 
charitable funds of Paris are distributed. When a case 
of want, disease, or death occurs and is reported at the 
Bureau de Bienfaisance of the district or parish, it is 
committed to one of these women. Off she flies on the 
wings of mercy. She seeks the moral as well as material 
good of the poor : she stands by the bed of disease with 
her own hands to administer medicine ; the bread she 
carries to feed the hungry is sweetened by her gentle 
kindness ; she pleads with the drunkard on behalf of his 
wife and starving children ; she stirs up the idle to help 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 



themselves ; " she separates between the clean and un- 
clean " — avoiding the abuses of indiscriminate charity, 
refusing allowances that would go to the drinking-shop, 
and aiding the modest, virtuous poverty which our system 
often leaves to suffering and cold neglect. No doubt 
these women are not faultless. To some considerable 
extent their narrow creed bounds and restrains their 
sympathies. Instances are not rare in which they seek 
to make the charity which they distribute a means of 
promoting the interests of the Roman Catholic Church ; 
and those of the Reformed Faith do not complain with- 
out reason that the poor Protestant does not always re- 
ceive fair dealing at the hands of the Sisters of Charity. 
Still, those who made this complaint to me, freely 
acknowledged that to the kind, considerate, and discrimi- 
nating labours of these women Paris owed not a little of 
that absence of squalid, ragged, abject wretchedness 
which fills some of the streets of our large cities with 
spectacles of pity and of horror. 

In the noble dome of St. Peter's, in the beautiful 
towers of Cologne, in the matchless spire of Strasburg, in 
the exquisite tracery of St. Ouen, we find the sublime 
and graceful in connection with Roman Catholic wor- 
ship. We admire — we do more — ^we imitate them ; and 
if it is right to take a lesson in architecture from Popish 
countries, it is better still to copy any good example 
which they may set us in redressing the wrongs and 
relieving the sufferings of the poor. 

The principle so happily illustrated in Paris, is not one 
which belongs to the Church of Rome, but to the Church 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 97 



of Christ. Before either pope or Popery, Jesus Christ, 
in that wondrous scene where, girt with a towel and fall- 
ing on bended knee, He washed his disciples' feet, 
taught his people to perform acts of personal kindness, 
and stoop to the lowliest offices of brotherly love and 
Christian charity. And God had, long before that, 
thundered out these great words loud over the heads of 
those who observed the offices of religion, but neglected 
the claims of charity — " Is it such a fast that I have 
chosen ? a day for a man to afflict his soul ? is it to bow 
down his head as a bulrush, and to spread sackcloth and 
ashes under him ? wilt thou call this a fast and an ac- 
ceptable day to the Lord ? Is not this the fast that ] 
have chosen % is it not to deal thy bread to the hungry, 
and that thou bring the poor that are cast out to thj 
house % when thou seest the naked, that thou cover him^ 
and that thou hide not thyself from thine own flesh." 

Why should our churches at home leave the poor to the 
care of mere officials'? I know some indeed charged 
with this duty who discharge it in a Christ-like spirit ; 
and though they wear no peculiar garb, nor belong to 
any organised system of sisterhood, we have thousands 
of women of all ranks, and belonging to all churches, 
who descend into the lowest abodes of poverty, and 
without any form or vows devote their lives to the glory 
of God and the good of humanity. But why should not 
these agents be multiplied a thousand-fold ; and without 
introducing any orders of sisterhood, why should not 
our Protestant churches lay aside their prejudices and 
wretched jealousies to co-operate in some well-organised 



98 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

and happy scheme which would afford to tens and hun- 
dreds of thousands of Christian women a field for their 
love and labours, not less profitable to themselves than 
to the poor ? Divided with skill, distributed by kindly 
hands, accompanied by a sympathy that would soften 
the hearts, and smiles that would lighten the homes, and 
counsels that would improve the habits of the poor, such 
charity would change the face of society, and make good 
these noble words : — 

The quality of Mercy is not strain'd ; 

It droppeth, as the gentle rain from Heaven 

Upon the place beneath ; it is twice blessed ; 

It blesseth him that gives and him that takes ; 

'Tis mightiest in the mightiest ; it becomes 

The throned monarch better than his crown ; 

His sceptre shows the force of temporal power. 

The attribute to awe and majesty, 

Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings ; 

But Mercy is above this sceptred sway ; 

It is an attribute to God himself. 

In addition to their cleanliness and the absence of 
poverty, the streets of Paris are remarkable for the 
absence of the appearance of vice. It is not there as 
with us, where, to the offence of modesty and the corrup- 
tion of morals, vice parades our streets ; and obtrudes 
herself as openly on the public eye as if the occupation 
of those who are at once her tools, slaves, and victims, 
were as respectable as it is infamous. As if we indicated 
an intention to lay rash hands on our country's ark, some 
people cry out. What, would you meddle with the liberty 
of the subject? The liberty of the subject ! Personal, 
political, ecclesiastical liberty, is worth all the blood that 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. %^ 

has been shed for it ; but we are sick of hearing thr 
name of hberty applied to such a matter. When the 
state of our streets is such that watchful parents are iB 
many cases afraid to send out their children, or servants, 
on honest business of an evening, the magistrate has 
ceased to be " a terror to evil-doers, and a praise and 
protection to those that do well." In such circumstance? 
— and they are ours — the liberty that virtue should enjoj 
is sacrificed to the licence of vice. Now the difference, 
and a very important one it is, between Paris on the one 
hand, and our large towns on the other, lies here, that 
there people have to seek vice, while with us vice is 
allowed to seek them. To copy the French in giving a 
quasi-legal sanction to licentiousness in order to ame- 
liorate or restrain its evils, is a measure to which I hope 
our country will never consent. The decency of oui 
streets may be secured without any such means. Ninety- 
nine out of every hundred of those who live on the wages 
of iniquity are as well known to the police as the " habit 
and repute " thieves of the town ; and the fear that any 
respectable woman might be cleared off the street is a 
mere bugbear — as worthless as would have been the ob- 
jection to the law against vagrancy, that honest men 
might be taken up for rogues. We denounce the French 
for such police regulations as seem to grant a legal recog- 
nition to vice, and at the same time allow it more free- 
dom than if it were legalised. This is surely absurd. It 
is as if those who altogether objected to Go* ernment 
licensing the sale of spirits were to consent that any man 
should have the right to open a drinking-shop at his own 

L.ofC. »* 



lOO THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

pleasure, to the detriment of the peace and morals of his 
neighbourhood. I ask people at home to look on the 
streets of Paris, and make their own as decent And it 
is, in the first place, no answer to say that the French 
after all are in point of morals not better, but worse, 
than ourselves. Admitting that, surely their inferior 
morality is as little owing to the greater decency of 
their streets as to the greater sobriety of their people 
— even as our superior virtues are as little due to the 
greater indecency of our streets as to the greater drunk- 
enness of our people. Not to these, but to our religious 
advantages and purer faith, to our Bibles and Sabbaths, 
we owe the superiority which we claim ; and which I do 
not deny. Nor, in the second place, are we to be 
silenced by the cry, Acts of parliament, magistrates and 
policemen, cannot make men moral or religious ! What 
cry so silly and senseless ? Who says, or ever said, they 
could? But these agencies, like flood dykes, can re- 
strain the overflowings of vice ; they can take stumbling- 
blocks out of the way ; they can protect the unwary from 
her snares; and by making and executing laws in the 
spirit of the prayer " lead us not into temptation," they 
can do much to rear up, in a virtuous and vigorous 
people, what, more than standing armies or iron navies, 
will prove our abiding glory and sure defence. In con- 
nection with this matter, I deem it a public and sacred 
duty to correct certain mis-statements, which some have 
rashly made, and others have eagerly seized on to point 
their sneers at religion, and blacken the character of our 
country — especially the northern section of the island. 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. lOI 

With her famous religious struggles, the severer discipline 
of her churches, and more strict views of Sabbath ob- 
servance, poor Scotland has always formed a favourite 
subject of attack with free-thinkers and loose livers. If 
they catch, or fancy they catch, her tripping, her shame 
seems to afford them (some being her own children) a 
sort of fiendish gratification ; like Indian savages round 
their victim, they dance with joy ; they tell it in Gath, 
and publish it in the streets of Askelon. Statements 
touching the number of illegitimate births in England, 
but especially in Scotland, are constantly cast in our teeth 
by foreigners ; and, given on the authority of writers at 
home, these fiimish infidels with an argument against 
Christianity, and Papists with sneers at Protestantism. 
See, says the libertine or worldling, all that comes of 
your Bibles and Sabbaths, your revivals and religious 
meetings, your preachings and prayers ! A set of Phari- 
sees ! read these statements from the hands of your own 
countrymen, and blush for shame ; you are no better, but 
worse than us. 

We deny this. In the first place, those who traduce 
our character, either conceal, or are ignorant of, the fact 
that there is an enormous amount of immorality abroad 
which is not disclosed by statistics — an immorality, hap- 
pily all but unknown in our own country, which springs 
from conjugal infidelity ; and that, again, in part at least, 
from what is equally notorious, — this namely, that mar- 
riage abroad is much less commonly an affair of the 
heart than of pecuniary and other considerations. I 
knew a man who, on informing a friend of his purpose 



IQ3 THE STREETS OF PARIS, 

of marriage, and being asked, who are you to be married 
to ? — replied, to 5600/. ! and I have found one uniform, 
concurrent testimony to the fact, that it is in this spirit 
that a large number of marriages in France are formed. 
This, as it needs no wit to divine, results, and must 
result, in social evils, which, though they may reduce 
society to a mass of festering corruption, do not figure in 
tables of statistics. Many things, indeed, are to be 
taken into consideration before these can be regarded as 
a fair, sure test of the comparative morality of different 
peoples. Bad as omr tables of illegitimacy are, much as 
they are to be deplored, and loudly as they call on pas- 
tors and parents, masters and guardians, to do their 
utmost to check our social evils, if they who make so 
much against us out of them told us all the truth about 
the Continent, our morality would appear vastly superior 
to that of France, or Italy, or any other Popish, or semi- 
infidel country. There are other and even surer tests of 
morality than statistical tables. Besides being imperfect 
in their details, they often leave concealed evils more 
horrible than any which they reveal. What conclusions 
are to be drawn from the house-sign which meets you 
everywhere in the streets of Paris, and of other towns in 
France, Sage-femme qui prend des pensionnaires ? or from 
this, that no young lady is considered as doing that which 
is either safe or respectable, who ventures out into the 
street in broad daylight without having, in a servant or 
mother or brother or father, a guardian and protector at 
her side ? 

But if people will go to statistics, to statistics let 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. IO3 

them go. I have gone over the Government Returns 
for France in the Statistiques de la France^ Mouvement 
de la Population pendant les Annees 1858, 1859, et i860, 
deuxieme Serie, tome xi. There are details in that 
volume with which, God be thanked, we have nothing 
corresponding. But without entering on these, let me 
keep to the matter in hand. Well, let us take Paris, 
the capital of France, and Quimper, the chief town of 
the department of Finisterre. I do not need to inform 
the most ignorant of my readers, that neither London, 
the capital of England, nor Edinburgh, the capital of 
Scotland, nor even Aberdeen, the chief town of the 
county of that name, and the worst according to statistics 
in Scotland, presents anything like this state of morals. 

Births Legitimate. Births lUegitimate. 
In 1858, in Paris . . 25,694 . . il,757 
„ in Quimper . 271 , . 123 

which makes nearly one-third of the whole number bom 
in these cities illegitimate.* 

Admitting that there are circumstances which, if taken 
into account, would to some extent modify our judgment 
on the immoral character of Paris, Lyons, and Quimper, 

* I have also obtained the official return for Lyons, which, standing 
thus, is only a shade better : — 

Births Legitimate, Births Illegitimate. 

In 1862 . . 44,368 . . . 15,655 

Instead of every third or fourth, in London it is only every twenty- 
fourth (the statistics are, however, not perfectly accurate) ; in Edin- 
burgh and Leith only every twelfth ; in Greenock only every 
twentieth ; and even in Aberdeen only every sixth child which is 
illegitimate. 



104 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 

more than enough remains, even on the ground of statis- 
tics, to silence the tongues which have sought to wound 
our reUgion through the sides of our country. 

Now, in regard especially to Scotland, which, though 
one in faith with England, yet holding stricter, if not 
sterner, views on some matters of Sabbath observance 
and practical piety, is a stock subject with Roman Catho- 
lics and infidels — covert and open, foreign and domestic. 
With what an air of triumph have appeals been made to 
the Government Tables of Statistics, to show that the 
number of illegitimate births is greater on the north than 
on the south side of the Tweed. Look at these Tables, 
men have said, and be done with your northern gabble 
about Sabbaths, sermons, revivals, and the points or 
principles of your endless Church controversies ! Well, 
though we have never hesitated to lay open the sores of 
our country for the purpose of healing them, we were 
happy to have something to say in answer to that taunt. 
We appealed to these very official Tables as proving this, 
as establishing the fact beyond all doubt or controversy, 
that the counties in Scotland, such as Sutherland and 
Ross-shire, most distinguished for their high Protestant 
principles and strict observance of the Lord's Day, were 
the very counties most distinguished for a low rate of 
illegitimate births — in other words, for their high morality. 
From that notable circumstance, as well as from other 
things, we felt sure that there lurked some great error in 
the official Tables, or in the conclusions that were drawn 
from them ; and though we have no wish, but the con- 
trary, to disparage England, there is no generous English- 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. 



los 



man but will sympathise with us in feeling happy that the 
error is at length detected and acknowledged ; and that 
Scotland can be no longer a stock subject with men who 
seem to like nothing so much as to have a hit at religion, 
and expose the failings of its professors. 

Justice requires that the true state of the case should 
be known. It is seen in the following extracts from the 
Census of Scotland for 1861, pubHshed in March of this 
year. 

" Table XXVII. Number of unmarried women who 
annually put themselves in the way of becoming mothers, 
and their proportion to the total unmarried women, from 
fifteen to forty-five years of age : — 





Number. 


Per 

Centage. 


Ratio: I 
in every 


England : Official Numbers. 

Ditto, corrected ditto 
Scotland .... 


156,757 

227,757 

30,947 


6-9 
10 'O 

7*3 


14-4 

90 

131 



*' Report, pages xxxix. and xl. 

" The registration of the illegitimate births is so im- 
perfect in England that it is not fair to compare the 
above facts relative to the unmarried women of Scotland 
with those of England, if we adhered to the official num- 
ber of illegitimate births as published in the Registrar- 
General's Reports. By his own acknowledgment before 
a committee of the House of Commons in the Irish 
Registration Bills in 186 1, that officer admitted that *the 
registration of births in England is defective; that we 



ia6 THE STREETS OF PARIS. 



lose 2<-,<3ccil>^-ths a-year in England, and the chiof part 
that escapes ui are the births of illegitimates in towns.' 
As the Census Commissioners of England for 1861, how- 
ever, on much surer data, state that 369,489 children in 
ten years, or 36,550 annually, are left unregistered, and 
although the probability is that by far the largest number 
of these is illegitimate, it is doing no injustice to England 
to assume that 20,000 at all events of those whose births 
escape registration are illegitimate, the accompanying 
Tables are accordingly drawn up on that assumption, &c. 

"As 355 married women between the ages of fifteen 
and forty-five are, however annually required in England 
to produce 100 legitimate children, and the unmarried 
women of that country may be supposed to produce 
children in the same proportion, according to the official 
or uncorrected numbers 6'g per cent., or one in every 
14*4, of the unmarried women in England annually put 
themselves in the way of becoming mothers. Where the 
proper correction, however, is made for the illegitimate 
births which escape registration, it appears that 227,757 
unmarried women, being exactly 10 per cent, or one in 
every nine unmarried women in England between the 
ages of fifteen and forty-five annually put themselves in 
the way of becoming mothers, Mn^ a much larger propor- 
tion than in Scotland." 

I add nothing by way of comment to these extracts. 
They speak for themselves, and should cover with con- 
fusion those who have been in the habit of aspersing the 
social manners and religious views of Scotland. Let me 
only express a hope that those who have propagated the 



THE STREETS OF PARIS. IO7 

scandal which these Tables disprove, will, though it can 
no longer supply them with a weapon of attack on Scot- 
tish Sabbaths and Scottish strictness, be brave and honest 
enough to give to the refutation a circulation as wide as 
they have given to the charge. Any way, it is satis- 
factory to feel that our island, the home of freedom and 
asylum of the oppressed, whether regard be had to its 
southern or northern division, can lift up an unblushing 
forehead in the face of the nations of Europe. Secure 
from revolutions which have shaken their thrones and 
inflicted on their countries all the crimes and cruelties of 
war, she stands calm and secure on the broad and solid 
foundation of a superior morality and a truer faith ; and 
in her unparalleled dominion, extensive commerce, un- 
rivalled energy, fullest liberty, the honour of her name, 
the plenty which fills her cup, the peace which blesses 
and the bravery which guards her shores, she presents 
the grandest example the world ever saw of the truth— 
" Righteousness exalteth a Nation.** 




SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH 
PROTESTANTISM. 

MOTHER remarkable feature of the streets of 
Paris is their aspect on the Lord's day. The 
fourth commandment of the Decalogue is 
openly set at nought ; and this in a way to shock those 
whose ideas of Sunday observance are not so strict, or — as 
they would say — severe and Judaical as ours in Scotland. 
In the morning and forenoon of the Sunday the tide of 
business flows on much as usual ; so that a stranger might 
fancy he had mistaken the day of the week. Even such as 
account themselves good Catholics — and these are com- 
paratively few in Paris — while they devote the morning 
to religion, give the forenoon to money, and the after 
noon and evening to the pursuit of pleasure, in excur- 
sions, promenades, operas, balls, and theatres. 

To come to details : on turning to my note-book, I 
find the following statistics of Sunday, 28th February, 
1864. These I had carefully gathered, that there might 
be no mistake as to the facts of the case. To have 
a fair, average view of matters, I took, as will be observed, 



SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. I09 

sections of different streets, all in the neighbourhood of 
our boarding-house. Of the shops there were — 



Open. 


Shut 




IS 


4 


in the Rue de la Madeleine. 


14 


5 


„ Rue du Faubourg St Honoid 


93 


21 


J, Rue St. Honore. 


13 


I 


„ Rue des Pyramides. 


57 


7 


„ Rue de Rivoli. 


15 





„ Passage. 



207 38 

This Table shows only one shop shut out of every six. 

Let my readers fancy that as they pass on their way to 
the house of God, they see almost all the shops in their 
native town or village standing open, with men and 
women buying and selling, and they have an idea of 
the desecration of the Lord's day in Paris. The tide 
and toil of business does not cease in many cases till 
night brings rest to its weary slaves. On returning from 
evening service, I have seen them still behind the 
counter, chained to the oar ; and in not a few instances 
playing cards when business was slack in the shop. A 
visit to Paris would convince the working classes that 
those are their worst friends who attempt to divest the 
first day of the week of that holiness which, as all ex- 
perience proves, affords the only security for rest and 
repose to the sons of toil. These painful scenes recalled 
the sagacity, as well as humanity and patriotism, ex- 
pressed by Adam Smith in his advice to one who, living 
to hold sounder views, had, in his early days, written an 
attack on the observance of the Lord's day, as practised 



no SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM, 

in our country. The celebrated author of the " Wealth 
of Nations" was himself no Christian. He did not 
believe in the binding obligation of the fourth Com- 
mandment j nor can he be said to have believed in the 
Bible itself. Yet, when his friend had finished reading 
the manuscript, Adam Smith advised him to commit it to 
the flames. A patriotic, though not a pious man, he said 
that since the common idea of the sacred nature of that 
day secured to the working classes, week by week, a 
period of repose and rest, the Sunday, even as a civil in- 
stitution, was an invaluable blessing. 

The picture of a Parisian Sunday would be imperfect 
unless we conveyed to our readers some idea of the 
manner in which pleasure, as well as business, is pursued 
on that sacred day. I might tell how, on passing through 
the Champs Elysees, we found its broad and beautiful 
walks crowded with thousands, dressed out in the gayest 
style, coquetting, laughing, and in many ways enjoying 
themselves with all the gaiety and sprightliness of the 
French character. There were men playing billiards ; 
while whirligigs and toys, set out for sale, were minis- 
tering to the merriment and pleasure of children. Save, 
indeed, for the rows of brilliant equipages which bore the 
beauty and fashion of Paris along the broad avenues, 
the scene presented very much of the aspect of a gay 
country fair. But my note-book, with its statistics, will, 
better than anything else, lift the curtain to show my 
readers what awaits our country if the door is once opened 
for ordinary amusements and pleasures on the Lord's day. 
On the Sunday already referred to, the >Sth February, 



SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. I til 

here axe the enjoyments and relaxation which Paris 
offers to its population as a substitute for what the 
French, and those who have become inoculated with 
their tastes, call the dulness of British Sabbaths. 

At the Opera. — "The Hviguenots," in five acts. 
„ Theatre-Frangais. — "UneChaine," a Comedy in five acts; 

and " The Yornig Husband," a Comedy in three acts. 
„ Opera-Comique. — *'The Black Domino." 
f, Odeon. — Representations of "The Relays and the WHl." 
y, Gymnase. — " Mont Joye," a Comedy in five acts. 
„ Theatre-Italien. — " Rigoletto," an Opera in four acts. 
„ Theatre-L3Tique. — " Faust," an Opera in five acts. 
„ Palais-Royal. — " La Gaunotte. " 
„ Porte St. -Martm.— " Faustine. " 
M Gaite. — " The House of the Bagnio Keeper." 
, „ Theatre du Chatelet. — " The Shipwreck of the Medusa. ** 
„ Theatre des Jeunes Artistes. — " Galatee." 
„ Varietes. — " Le Petit de la Rue Ponceau," a Comedy in two 

acts, Hvely and very amusing ; preceded by " The Sister 

of Jocrice," and followed by ** A Trooper who follows 

the Nurserymaids." 

Such is a Parisian Sunday ! 

The tide, however, is on the turn. Comparatively few 
as are the shops shut on the Lord's day, the number is, I 
am assured, greater than it was twenty or thirty years 
ago. Some no doubt are closed for merely secular ob- 
jects ; but we have reason to know that others are shut 
from a growing regard to the Lord's day ; and it was 
with the pleasures of hope that, here and there, we read 
this notice, painted in large characters on the closed 
shutters, Ferme le Dimanche et les Fetes. Nor are higher 
ideas of the sacredness of Sunday confined to Protestants. 
I saw and hailed with delight signs, though few and fai 



113 SUNDAY IN PARIS. AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM, 

between, of sounder views even among the Roman Catho- 
lics. Let me illustrate this by an example taken from the 
church of St. Joseph in the Popish town of Quimper. 
Near by the high altar we found an artificial mount 
which rose five feet high, and was tastefully constructed 
of beautiful green moss. It was topped by a graceful 
form of the Virgin. Her head was circled by a golden 
glory, and wore a glittering crown with three stars. 
Before the Mother of Jesus stood the figures of two 
Breton children — a boy and girl, over whom she was 
bending with a 'look of tender kindness. The group was 
pretty and picturesque; but the remarkable thing was 
the inscription on the pedestal which supported the 
figures — the instruction which the Virgin was repre- 
sented as giving to the children. Here it is : — 

" Ze Blaspheme et la Profanation du Dimanche voilh ce 
qui excite le plus la colhre de man JFils." 

Anglice — 

" The Blasphemy and Profanation of Sunday is that 
which most excites the anger of my Son." 

Perhaps the most satisfactory proof of a growing re- 
gard for a better observance of the Lord's day, lies in 
the fact which I learned in Paris, that this great subject, 
some years ago, brought Protestants and Papists together; 
that, though it did not succeed, an attempt was made at 
united action on this matter. It is due to the French 
authorities to add, that although in reviews of troops and 
many things else the " leaders of this people cause them 
to err, and they that are led ot them are destroyed," the 
government has shown itself favourable to such attempts. 



SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. II3 

It has issued decree on decree against any work being 
done on the Lord's day in its dockyards and other 
places, for which there was no clear and strong neces- 
sity. No doubt these have been often evaded ; still it 
is well for the country and creditable to the ruling 
powers, that the Government has raised its voice in 
favour of what is as consonant to the word of God as to 
the best interests of all classes of the community. How- 
ever slowly it comes creeping in, the tide has certainly 
turned. A better day is dawning over France. And, 
revering the memory of her distinguished martyrs, ad- 
miring the genius and talents of her people, and seeing 
much in them to love and esteem, we cannot but hail 
with pleasure the coming time when this great nation, 
listening to the counsel, will enjoy the blessing of these 
words : " If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, 
from doing thy pleasure on my holy day, and call the 
Sabbath a delight, the holy of the Lord honourable; and 
shalt honour him, not doing thine own ways, nor finding 
thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words ; then 
shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord, and I will cause 
thee to ride upon the high places of the earth : the 
mouth of the Lord hath spoken it*' 

Our hope for France lies not in the Church of Rome, 
but in what deserves some remarks, namely, The Progress 
of Protestantism. 

The most fatal day for France was not Cressy, nor 
Pavia, nor Waterloo, but that which saw Henry IV. 
abandon his faith and become a Papist for the posses- 
sion of Paris. Since then it has gone ill with morals, 

I 



114 SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. 

and truth, and religion. But I have the best grounds 
for believing that Protestantism is now making decided 
progress among her intellectual classes, and in those 
parts of the country which form centres of influence. 
It is otherwise indeed in rural districts, and wherever 
the Protestant ministers hold rationalistic errors. I 
heard, for example, of a congregation of Protestants 
which under such a ministry has dwindled down, within 
the last twenty years, from three thousand to six hundred 
souls j and of another which within the same time has 
been reduced from six hundred to fifty. No wonder ! 
Under the ministry of men who do not preach the saving 
doctrines of the Bible, nor even believe in its inspiration, 
piety dies ; and must die. 

Again, where a Roman Catholic in France is to be 
married to a Protestant, the priest usually refuses to 
celebrate the marriage according to the form of his 
Church, except on condition that the children (if any) 
shall be reared in her faith ; and these terms are usually 
agreed to by the party, who, though a Protestant in 
name, is in fact, like his pastor, indifferent to religion. 
The consequence is inevitable — such cold and feeble 
Protestantism must go down in the struggle with Popery. 
There is another cause to account for the diminution of 
Protestantism in the provinces and rural districts. The 
communes^ or parishes, of France number 38,000; and 
throughout these, the Protestants have only 1500 places 
of worship and 1000 schools. In many instances, there- 
fore, the latter have to seek education for their children 
in Roman Catholic schools ; and the children being thus 



SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. II5 

brought at an early and impressible age under the influ- 
ence of Popery, are prepared afterwards to fall into her 
snares and lapse into the Church of Rome. Besides, 
when a Protestant removes from the place of his birth, 
since there are only 1500 places of worship belonging to 
the Reformed Church in the 38,000 communes of France, 
there are more than twenty chances to one against his 
finding in the place to which he has gone any church of 
his own and his fathers' faith. He is removed from his 
family; and, surrounded by an entirely Roman Catholic 
population, he becomes connected with them by marriage 
or otherwise. Struggling for a-while against adverse cir- 
cumstances, he is at length borne along by the current, 
and becomes absorbed in the mass of Popery among 
which he lives and moves, and has his being — a result 
that, though lamentable, is certainly not wonderful. To 
such an extent, indeed, do these causes operate on the 
relative proportions of Roman Catholics and Protestants 
in France, that the gains which Protestantism makes by 
the conversion of Papists are more than counterbalanced 
by the losses it suffers in this way. Still, the state of 
matters is not so sad and disheartening as might be 
supposed. Under such apparently unfavourable circum- 
stances the truth is making progress. The Protestant 
Church, though meanwhile not gaining in point of 
numbers, is gaining in real life and power. Making 
many conversions from among the Roman Catholic 
population, it finds in every one won over to its ranks 
by the force of truth, an advocate and adherent worth a 
dozen such as it loses through inuiflerence to religion. 

i 3 



Il6 SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. 

The progress of Protestantism in the way of conver 
sion of Papists is quite remarkable in some, especially 
the larger, towns of France. Take, for example, Lyons 
and Paris — cities which I select, because I had my 
infomiation concerning them from persons thoroughly 
acquainted with the facts. In Lyons, where the mass of 
the people are intensely Papistical, there was, in 1836, 
one National Reformed Church, and only one small con- 
gregation of Evangelical Protestants. The latter, a little 
flock, found themselves amply accommodated in a small 
room. After twenty years, or so — the statistics which 
my informant gave me applying to 1855 — the congrega- 
tion which a little room once contained, had grown into 
a church of 1200 souls. This remarkable increase was 
due mainly to conversions. Nor is that all. Besides 
this large congregation and that of the National Reformed 
Church, there are now five other Protestant chapels in 
Lyons, where the Truth, as it is in Jesus, is faithfully 
preached. Such is the progress which Protestantism has 
made, and is making, in that hotbed of Popery. Now 
as to Paris, its rate of progress there has been hardly 
less remarkable. In 1827, when I first knew that gay 
capital, there were, including French, English, and Ger- 
man congregations, not more than five or six Protestant 
churches; but now, in 1864, there are thirty-five at least; 
an enormous increase compared with that of the popula- 
tion. Between the two periods, the population has in- 
creased little more than twofold, but the Protestant 
churches have increased not less than sixfold. This gain 
ha§ (been the conquest of Truth over Error ; the increased 



SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. 1 17 

number of Protestants being due chiefly to conversions 
from Popery. For example, I was informed by some 
who knew the congregation well, that in a crowded 
French church where I worshipped one Sunday, nearly 
one half of the audience were converts — having been 
bom and brought up Roman Catholics. Such, also, was 
the history of nearly three-fourths of those with whom I 
worshipped in another church. 

These are promising and remarkable results. How 
were they produced? Having to deal with Popery at 
home, it were instructive as well as interesting to know 
by what agency, God blessing the means, so signal a 
triumph has been achieved — what are the weapons with 
which Truth has gone down into the battle-field, and won 
the day — what lessons British Protestants may learn from 
those who have fought the good fight so well in France. 
Now, I met with some who felt the deepest interest and 
had taken an active part in the work. They stated that 
controversy which, though valuable in its own time and 
place, is apt to become acrid and personal, had not been 
the means of their success. The agents employed were 
Christian men, with love in their hearts, kindness on their 
lips, and courtesy in their manners, who visited the homes 
of the people, some as colporteurs, others as city mis- 
sionaries and regularly ordained ministers of the Gospel ; 
and the instruments with which they wrought were tracts, 
the Holy Scriptures, and especially the New Testament, 
privately but widely circulated. Popery in Paris has 
yielded more to sapping and mining than to any fierce 
and open assaults, preceded hy a blare of trumpets. I'he 



Il8 SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM, 

time may come for open assault; but, as in ordinary wai, 
that assault is most likely to be successful which is pre- 
ceded by long and quiet and patient labours. 

I was not only particular in my inquiries on this sub- 
ject, but had myself an opportunity of seeing how the 
evangelists and agents of the Reformed Faith go to work. 
I accompanied one of the city missionaries, and spent 
some hours with him in visiting his district. On our way 
he informed me that he and his fellow-labourers never 
thrust themselves on the people. They contrived, in the 
first instance, to gain admission to their homes by means 
of some family in whose house they had already obtained 
a footing. Madame Chaplain, for example, is a blanchis- 
seuse; this honest washerwoman introduces the missionary 
to Jacque Laval, a charbonnier, from whom she buys wood 
and charcoal ; and he in his turn introduces our evangelist 
to the concierge, where Widow Leufroy sits portress by 
the gate of the court which, after the Paris fashion, con- 
tains the homes of a dozen families. On reaching the 
field of the good man's labours, which was inhabited 
chiefly by the working and humbler classes, we com- 
menced the work of visitation ; and I could not but 
admire the skill with which he, a thoroughly devout but 
also very shrewd man, adapted himself to the circum- 
stances and character of those with whom he had to deal. 
In one case, the man and his wife were inquirers after 
%Q truth. They had lost all faith in Popery. But, 
though usually going to the Reformed Church, they had 
not yet embraced Protestantism. In another, the woman, 
whom we found taking her mid-day meal of bread and 



SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. 1 19 

apples, was still a Roman Catholic ; but the kind, lively, 
chatty body, full of gesticulation and quick to under- 
stand, had a Bible on her table, and was ready to hear 
the truth. In another still, not to multiply instances, we 
enjoyed the pleasure of meeting a singularly happy and 
devout Christian. Bom and bred in the Church of 
Rome, he had come out of her and brought not a rag 
of the graveclothes with him. Providing things honest 
in the sight of all men, he was busy at his trade as we 
entered ; but so soon as he recognised the missionary, 
whom he received very warmly, he laid aside his work. 
He entered eagerly into conversation on the things of 
"the kingdom;" and his fine intelligent countenance 
" shone " as he spoke of Jesus, and expatiated on the 
happiness which he had enjoyed since he was brought to 
an experimental knowledge of the truth. 

Such are the means which the Protestants of France 
have employed with remarkable success against their two 
great antagonists, Popery and Infidelity. With the readi- 
ness which their countrymen show to rival us in the arts 
of peace or the instruments of war, they have lately taken 
a lesson firom British Christians, and summoned Bible 
Women, as they are called, to their help. The success 
of these agents has been as remarkable in Paris as in our 
own great cities — perhaps even more so. They have 
found access to quarters which had proved quite inacces- 
sible to the ordinary missionaries. I refer to the dlan^ 
chisseuses, or washerwomen of Paris. These are a very 
numerous class; they have many large establishments 
scattered over the city ; they are to be seen by hundreds 



I20 SUNDAY IN PAHS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. 

busy in covered boats, which lie moored along the quays 
of the Seine; they form, after a fashion, a regular sis- 
terhood, having a fete-day of their own, on which, gaily 
dressed, and abandoning themselves to idleness and 
mirth, they parade the streets of Paris in imposing and 
long procession. Including a proportion of decent 
and respectable persons, they are, as a class, bold, 
coarse, daring, and dissolute. The missionaries at- 
tempted to make a lodgment for the Gospel among 
them; but they were soon put hors de combat^ and were 
glad to escape from their ribald tongues — if not sharp 
claws. Yet, as a gentle hand will open a lock which 
refuses to yield to masculine strength and force, these 
women have succeeded in doing what baffled the mis- 
sionaries. They have made good their access to the 
blanchisseuses; and such success has crowned their 
labors, that one of them was found to have sold more 
Bibles in one month among the washerwomen than 
had been disposed of by all the other missionaries 
during the same period throughout all the other quar- 
ters of Paris. 

These facts prove what every lover of truth and lib- 
erty will rejoice in; this, namely, that the Protestantism 
of France is not only not dead, but no longer sleepeth. 
There is still much of Rationalism and semi-infidelity 
among its ministers and adherents; but the tide which 
has turned is flowing full and strong in the direction 
of a real and lively Christianity. The " Eglise Indepen- 
dante," at the head of which Frederic Monod stood — a 
man of mark in all the Christian world for his zeal, his 
abundant labors, and self-denying piety — is constantly 



SUNDAY IN PARIS. AND FRENCH PROTESTi^NTI?M. W 

adding to its churches and adherents. The NatioDa' 
Reformed Church also, which is connected with the 
State that endows Papists, Protestants, and Jews alike, 
and of which Adolph Monod, Frederic's devout and 
eloquent brother, was a distinguished ornament and 
minister, is steadily returning to the faith of her famous 
founders — of men whom France, at the bidding of 
Popery, hunted from her borders, or murdered in hei 
streets. A remarkable proof of this occurred while we 
were in Paris, which is well worth mentioning. 

The " Temple of L'Oratoire," the principal edifice ol 
the National Reformed Church in Paris, had had for one 
of its preachers the son of its oldest minister. He, 
Coquerel fils^ as he is called, is, as I learned from some 
who know him intimately, a very amiable man. AU 
Paris, or rather France, knows that he is a most elo- 
quent man. Such indeed are his powers and fame, that 
he was in constant request as a preacher of public ser- 
mons. Papists and Protestants flocked to the church 
where he was advertised to preach. None gathered such 
crowds of men, or collections of money. Well, when w€ 
were in Paris the time arrived when the question hac 
to be settled, whether his engagement as a preacher is 
"L'Oratoire" should or should not be renewed. The 
decision was in the hands of the Consistoire — an ecclesi- 
astical Court, corresponding to a Scotch Presbytery ; its 
members being the ministers and lay representatives ol 
the congregations in and around Paris which belong to 
the National Reformed Church. The Court met; the 
matter was discussed; and Coquerel fils, beloved by all 



132 SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. 

who knew him and admired by tout le monde^ was 
rejected. The votes of the majority refused him. And 
why? Because he had publicly lauded Renan, and 
avowed Rationalistic opinions. The bold position which 
the Consistory took, and which they continue to maintain 
against a storm of abuse from all the infidel and semi- 
infidel newspapers of Paris, is a most palpable and grati- 
fying evidence of the revival of pure religion and vital 
godliness in the National Reformed Church. An omen 
for good, it opens up a great and glorious future, when 
France shall go forth to the emancipation of her people 
from Popery and Infidelity " fair as the moon, clear as 
the sun, and terrible as an army with banners." Here 
the trumpet has uttered no uncertain sound. The Church 
has spoken out ; and it cannot fail to gladden the hearts 
of thousands to hear her voice sounding so loud and 
clear in the words of Guizot (one of the members of the 
Consistoire), the great statesman, historian, and philo- 
sopher. The following quotation from his speech I ex- 
tract from the Communication du Conseil Presbyterat 
aux Fideles sur le non-renouvellement de la suffragance de 
M, le Pasteur Atha7iase Coquerel fils. " In a sermon,'' 
said Guizot, " upon the unity of the Church, Monsieur 
Coquerel fils calls the Socinians his Christian brothers, 
A Church into which the Socinians are admitted as 
brothers cannot be a Christian Church. The Socinians, 
like all others, are free to unite together. Most unjustly 
are men getting up a cry of the Inquisition and the times 
of persecution. The times are happily changed : each 
one is free to imite with those who share his opinions. 



SUNDAY IN PARIS, AND FRENCH PROTESTANTISM. I23 

We do not interfere with the liberty of individuals ; but 
they have no right to ask us to be indifferent in the face 
of manifestations — it may be in preaching, it may be 
otherwise — against what we regard as the very founda- 
tions of Christianity. There is a stream flowing against 
the Christian faith, and we ought carefully to guard 
against anything which could swell its waters. I myselt 
attach a great importance to religious feelings, but I 
regard dogmas as their source. It is from a belief in the 
divinity of Jesus Christ, his incarnation and redemption, 
that Christian feelings spring. Dogmas are their foun- 
dation. We wish to drive away none. Every one can 
abide in the Church; but can we give her as leaders 
those who show themselves so indifferent to doctrines, 
those who reject what we regard as the very foundation 
of the faith?" 

What a pleasing thing it is to see one of the greatest 
of living men come forward to proclaim the precious old 
faith ! All honour to Guizot for throwing himself into 
the battle against Renans, Coquerels, and Colensos, and 
confronting the whole array of " advanced thinkers " as 
they are now called, — '* free thinkers " as they once were 
called. 




SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

I. — DR. CHALMERS AND THE COWGATE. 

|DINBURGH stands on three hills, or long, 
''^■'"' lofty, parallel ridges. On the west, her castle, 



once formidable with its irowning batteries, 
crowns the great mass of rock which terminates precipi- 
tately the central ridge ; on the east rise Salisbury Crags, 
with their mural crown and the lion's head of Arthur's 
Seat towering over them; while the Calton Hill stands in 
the heart of the living city, broken with cliffs, enamelled 
with golden furze, feathered with trees, and studded with 
monuments to the mighty dead — features these to which 
Edinburgh owes a locality unrivalled for its picturesque 
effects. The passenger may thread the streets of Lon- 
don for hours and miles, nor see else on either hand but 
hues of brick houses, and overhead a ribbon of dirty 
blue ; but there are few streets in " the grey capital of 
the north " where the eye, weary of stone houses and 
dusty pavements, is not regaled with pleasant glimpses 
of cra,gs, or green hills, or the great blue sea. No one 
who has stood on the hoary battlements of the castle and 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 12$ 

looked down on the scene spread out before him, the 
singular combination of art and nature, of the sublime 
and beautiful, of bold architecture and hanging gardens, 
of highland ruggedness and lowland sweetness — the frame 
of this picture, a broad arm of the sea, studded with gems 
of islands, gleaming with white sails, and backed by a 
range of hills — no one who has seen this but will excuse 
Scotchmen for thinking that their lines have fallen to 
them in pleasant places, or applying to their old capital, 
words which glorified an older and holier city : — 

Mount Zion stands most beautiful. 
The joy of all the land. 

In consequence of its peculiar as well as picturesque 
locality, Edinburgh is traversed from west to east by two 
great valleys. That lying on the north of the central 
hilly ridge was a loch some hundred years ago. Her 
defence in unquiet times, it is now her ornament ; and 
more than an ornament — its bed, with a patriotic and 
Christian regard to the welfare of the working classes, 
being turned into beautiful gardens, where wc»rkmen relax 
from their toils and inhale draughts of health. The cor- 
responding valley to the south had also once been a loch, 
a marsh at least ; but long centuries ago, before the 
mournful field of Flodden, the population, outgrowing 
the limits of the old walls, poured over into this valley ; 
and it was turned into an open suburb, and peopled by 
princes and the nobles of the land. It went, and still 
goes, by the nanae of the Cowgate. The same in name, 
how different now its aspect and people ! Now-a-days, 



126 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

two bridges connect the parts of the city which ?tand on 
the southern ridge, with the High Street on the central 
one ; each, as they bestride the valley, forming a level 
roadway flanked by lines of houses, save where the 
middle arch spans the Cowgate. It was there, where one 
looks down on the street below, and on the foul crowded 
closes that stretch, like ribs, down into the Cowgate, I 
stood on a gloomy day in the fall of the year. The 
streets were a puddle ; the heavy air, loaded with smoke, 
was thick and murky ; right below lay the narrow 
street of dingy tenements, whose toppling chimneys 
and patched and battered roofs were apt emblems of the 
fortunes of most of its tenants. Of these, some were 
lying over the sills of windows innocent of glass, or 
stuffed with old hats and dirty rags ; others, coarse-look- 
ing women with squalid children in their arms or at their 
feet, stood in groups at the close-mouths — ^here with 
empty laughter, chaffing any passing acquaintance — there 
screaming each other down in a drunken brawl, or stand- 
ing sullen and silent, with hunger and ill-usage in their 
saddened looks. A brewer's cart, threatening to crush 
beneath its ponderous wheels the ragged urchins who had 
no other playground, rumbled over the causeway — 
drowning the quavering voice of one whose drooping 
head and scanty dress were ill in harmony with song, 
but not drowning the shrill pipe of an Irish girl, who 
thumped the back of an unlucky donkey and cried her 
herrings at ''three a penny." So looked the pansh I had 
come to cultivate : and while contrasting the scene below 
with pleasant recollections of a parish I had just left — its 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 127 

singing larks, daisied pastures, hedges of hoary thorn, 
fragrant bean-fields and smiling gardens, decent peasants, 
stalwart lads and blooming lasses, and the grand blue 
sea rolling its lines of snowy breakers on the shore — 
my rather sad and sombre ruminations were sudden^ 
checked. A hand was laid on my shoulder. I turned 
round, to find Dr. Chalmers at my elbow. 

Courted by the great, Chalmers' s)mapathies were with 
the masses. Their oppression roused him like a lion; 
their neglect stirred his indignation; their sufferings 
touched his soul with such tender pity that the horrors 
of the Irish and Highland famines were like to break 
his heart. He loved mankind. Cherishing a profound 
veneration for all things ancient, — monarchy, the aristo- 
cracy, seats of learning such as Oxford, ecclesiastical 
establishments hoar with years, and associated with the 
memory of champions who went out from their gates to 
meet the infidel and do battle for the Faith, — he had no 
sympathy with such as look down on the lower classes. 
Odi profanum vulgus was not his motto. His aspirations 
were not to drag the upper classes down to the level of the 
lower, but to improve the economic, educational, moral, 
and religious condition of the lowest stratum of society ; 
and so, as when the base of a pyramid is raised, to raise 
all the courses of the superstructure up to royalty — sitting 
high and lone on the throne. This great and good man 
knew that I had accepted an Edinburgh charge mainly 
for the purpose of trying what the parochial or territorial 
system, fairly wrought, could do toward Christianising the 
heathendom beneath our feet, and restoring the denizens 



128 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

of the Cowgate and its closes to sober, decent, and 
church-going habits. City missionaries laboured in this 
enterprise. But though no man looked more benig- 
nan^ly on their labours than Dr. Chalmers, he held that 
a solitary missionary, without church, school, or coadju- 
tors, could do little more than nurse up one plant of 
grace here and another there, pick one jewel out of this 
dust-heap and another out of that. To change the face 
of a district required, in his opinion, a more extensive 
and efficient system of cultivation — a school for children ; 
a church with its door open to the poorest of the inhabi- 
tants ; and a large staff of zealous men and women — 
each with their own section of families to visit, and all 
working in harmony, like bees in a hive, under the direc- 
tion of the minister, their captain, bishop, or superin- 
tendent. Emigrants know to their cost, that it requires a 
much greater outlay of money and labour to clear the 
forest, root out stumps, trench the soil, sink drains, and 
raise fences — in short, bring waste land under cultivation, 
than to keep it cultivated ; in other words, to make a 
farm than maintain one. This is equally true of moral 
as of natural husbandry. So to bring in what Dr. 
Chalmers, borrowing an expression from old Scotch agri- 
culture, called the outfield^ he considered it indispen- 
sable to have, besides a church and school with their 
minister and teacher, a territory manageable in point of 
population, and a large staff of Christian agents, each 
charged with the care of some dozen or half dozen fami- 
lies, and the duty of paying them frequent and sys- 
tematic visits. Thus only can we elevate the habits and 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 129 

improve the homes of such people ; win the children to 
school, and themselves to church ; and so relieve their 
temporal wants as to teach them to stand on their own 
feet, instead of leaning on others. 

Public-houses opened in our streets will get customers 
without any other agency than men's appetites. To bru- 
talise men with whisky, it is enough to set before them 
" an open door." An open door will not secure the good 
sought by schools and churches. These are least appre- 
ciated where they are most needed. Hence the need of 
a staff of earnest men and women to work in the terri- 
tory, each having a sphere of families so small that visits 
may be paid to them at least once a week without en- 
croaching on the time which the cares of the visitor's 
family or business require. To build churches and 
schools merely, is to offer stones in place of bread. 
Living, loving Christian agents m-ust, Elijah like, take the 
dead, as it were, into their arms that they may be brought 
to life — an element of success this which I trust will be 
brought into vigorous play by the Bishop of London and 
those Churchmen, by Mr. Morley and those Noncon- 
formists, who are making such praiseworthy efforts to 
overtake the spiritual destitution of the metropolis. The 
worth and wealth and kindness of Christian congrega- 
tions are thus brought to fertilise the barren spots of the 
land. So wrought, the success of the territorial system 
in Edinburgh has been remarkable — so remarkable, in- 
deed, as to prove that if every Christian congregation in 
our large towns, instead of looking only at its own things, 
would, with the heart of the good Samaritan, look at the 



IJO SKETCHES OP THE COWGATE. 

things of others, and charge itself with the duty of Chris- 
tianising some neglected district, we should see the desert 
in a few years blossoming like the rose. So it blossomed 
once under the parochial system. But it had fallen into 
utter decay; partly through the negligence of the clergy, 
and partly through the exaction of such exorbitant seat- 
rents as set up a popular minister to the hammer, and 
banished the working-classes from the parish church. 
Meanwhile, as I have already remarked, Dr. Chalmers 
knew that I had come, God helping me, to restore it — 
" to build the old waste places ; raise up the foundations 
of many generations ; and be called the repairer of the 
breach, the restorer of paths to dwell in." Hopeful of 
success, he surveyed the scene beneath us, and his eye, 
which often wore a dreamy stare, kindled at the prospect 
of seeing that wilderness become an Eden, these foul 
haunts of darkness, drunkenness, and disease, changed 
into " dwellings of the righteous where is heard the voice 
of melody." Contemplating the scene for a little in 
silence, all at once, with his broad Luther-like face glow- 
ing with enthusiasm, he waved his arm to exclaim, " A 
beautiful field, sir ; a very fine field of operation." 

I needed his enthusiasm to encourage me. The con- 
trast, both moral and physical, between my present and 
former sphere was such as, without God's help, to appal 
the stoutest heart. My country parish had no Papists, 
and I had come to one that swarmed with them ; my 
country parish had only one public-house, and I had 
come to one where tippling abounded, and the owners 
of dram-shops grew like toad-stools on the public ruin ; 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I3I 

with one thousand inhabitants my country parish had 
but one man who could not read, and I had come to one 
with hundreds who did not know a letter ; my country 
parish was not disgraced by one drunken woman, and I 
had come to one where women drank and scores of 
mothers starved their infants to feed their vices; my 
country parish might show a darned but not a ragged 
coat, and I had come to one of loop-holed poverty, where 
backs were hung with rags, and the naked, red, cracked, 
ulcered feet of little shivering creatures trode the icy 
streets ; in my country parish there was but one person 
who did not attend the house of God, and I had come 
to one where only five of the first one hundred and fifty 
I visited ever entered either church or chapel ; my old 
country parish had not a house without at least one 
Bible, and I had come to one where many families had 
neither a Bible on the shelf nor a bedstead on the 
floor. Inside and outside, the roll might be written with 
" Lamentation, mourning, and woe." 

In this field I spent much of the first five or six years 
of my ministry in Edinburgh. And though it was a hard 
but profitable training for future spheres of usefulness, 
the limbs were often weary and tlie heart sad, and in 
Close pent-up rooms where typhus mowed down its vic- 
tims, as grass falls to the scythe, life itself was not 
seldom exposed to danger. In the seeming hopelessness 
of accomplishing much permanent good, one was ofi;en 
sent to the throne of grace, crying, " Vain is the help of 
man ! Arise, O Lord, and plead the cause that is thine 
own ! " And yet I and my coadjutors were not without 

K 2 



13* SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

such a measure of success as warranted the hope of 
accomplishing a great work, and proving, through patience, 
pains, and prayer, the truth of these noble words : — 

We have not wings, we cannot soar : 

But we have feet to scale and climb 
By slow degrees, by more and more, 

The cloudy summits of our time. 

The mighty pyramids of stone 

That wedge-like cleave the desert aii% 

When nearer seen, and better known. 
Are but gigantic flights of stairs. 

The distant mountains, that uprear 

Their solid bastions to the skies, 
Are crossed by pathways, that appear 

As we to higher levels rise. 

The heights by great men reached and kept, 

Were not attained by sudden flight ; 
But they, while their companions slept. 

Were toiling upward in the night. 

Standing on what too long we bore 

With shoulders bent and downcast eyes^ 

We may discern — unseen before — 
A path to higher destinies. 

I propose in a series of sketches to introduce my 
readers to the Cowgate and its neighbourhood. In 
attempting this I labour under the disadvantage of draw- 
ing on impressions more or less defaced by the constant 
tread of a crowded life ; still I trust they may prove use- 
ful — awakening Christian sympathy, and stimulating to 
greater efforts on behalf of many who have been as much 
sinned against as sinning. Before I bring the actors on 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I33 

the stage, I will attempt in my next paper some further 
account of the scenes amid which they moved. They 
are dingy and forbidding. On their mouldering tene- 
ments, with a hand which changes all things but God's 
blessed word, Time has written " Ichabod," the glory is 
departed : yet sacred memories and stirring associations 
cling to their old walls, like the green glossy mantle with 
which ivy clothes a crumbling ruin. 




SKJETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

II. — OLD HOUSES AND INSCRIPTIONS. 

LEXANDER ALESSE, a canon of St. AndreVt 
and a reformer before the Reformation, who 
went abroad in 1532 to escape persecution 
at the hands of the Romish clergy, writes of the 
Cowgate, or Via Vaccarum, as he calls it — In qua habi- 
tant patricii et senatores urhis et in qua sunt principum 
regni palatia, ubi nihil est humile aut rusticum, sed omnia 
magnifica. In our age — such in God's good providence 
has been the progress of society — comforts fall to the 
share of tradesmen which nobles did not enjoy in the 
days of this worthy canon. His ideas of magnificence 
must, therefore, have been different from ours — a circum- 
stance to which many, as they look down on the Cow- 
gate, might attribute the glowing terms in which he 
describes it as all magnificent, and the fit abode of 
nobles. Yet, like the hope of immortality, our sense of 
right and wrong, the silent homage which vice pays to 
virtue, and those other vestiges of our original innocence 
which adorn the ruins of humanity, not a is^t memorials 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 135 

of sumptuous grandeur linger about these smoke-be- 
grimed, toppling tenements. Where windows were 
patched, and rooms were bare walls, and floors were 
crusted with dirt, and ragged children bore evidence of 
want in their sallow colour and wasted forms, I have 
seen vestiges of former splendour — in bits of highly- 
ornate ceilings, massive mahogany balustrades and 
marble mantelpieces, a painted face looking out from 
the wall through the dirty whitewash that conceaixivi 
the rest of the picture. Some one has said, all memo 
rials are sad. These were ; calling up days when rank 
and beauty crowded those apartments, and their floors 
shook to dances, and their walls were hung with tapestry 
embroidered by fair ladies' fingers, and wine sparkled in 
golden cups, and luxury spread her board. 

For example : I remember being called to the dying 
bed of the wife of an old man. He had seen better 
days. Though his neighbours were vulgar, his own 
manners were refined; his dress, though threadbare, 
was always well brushed ; his long locks, which were as 
white as snow, were also as clean as it ; the misfortunes 
which had saddened his countenance had not soured his 
temper. It was kept sweet, and his spirit gentle and 
submissive, by the grace of God. Sober among drunk- 
ards, decent among the depraved, and among hundreds 
who paid no respect whatever to religion, devout and 
regular in his attendance on public worship, he was 
what, in a sense, all Christians may and should be — a 
light shining in a dark place. His wife — and hers was 
no singular case — had been a drunkard ;; with such a 



136 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

craving for the bottle that to keep his Sunday dress 
from going, as all things else had gone, for whisky, he 
had to commit it to the custody of a kind neighbour. 
On reaching his home the scene which presented itself 
was melancholy to the last degree. The spacious apart- 
ment contained hardly a stick of furniture; the walls 
were foul with dust and hung with cobwebs ; the air was 
close and stifling ; in one corner was a heap of straw, on 
which, without bed or other covering than her ragged 
body-clothes, lay his wife — drunk and dying — insensible 
to anything I could tell of Him who pities the worst of 
sinners, and can save at the uttermost. I was haunted 
with dreadful forebodings. Yet while standing by one 
who, with the death-rattle in her throat, was hurrying 
away, drunk, to judgment, I could not help noticing that 
the handful of cinders on the hearth was smouldering 
beneath a shattered mantelpiece of marble, and that 
beautifully-modelled figures of the Seasons were looking 
down from the ceiling on this shocking spectacle. Sic 
transit gloria mmidi — the fashion of this world passeth 
away. 

Musty charters and old history confirm the description 
of the Canon of St. Andrews. It was in this district, 
proverbial now for meanness, that a splendid banquet 
was given to the Danish nobles and ambassadors in 
1590, "at the requeist," says the old chronicle, "of the 
Kingis Majestic & for honour of the toun." Here royalty 
itself occasionally lodged. Here Argyll, Mar, Bothwell, 
and other nobles, had their town mansions. Here stood 
the palace pf that Archbishop of Glasgow whose scheming 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 1 37 

and turbulent life tempted the fate that closed it, — ^when 
they hanged him at Stirling dressed out in full canonicals 
A story related of this churchman is instructive, as show- 
ing from what kind of clergy the Reformation delivered 
our country. Gawin Douglas, the poet-Bishop of Dun- 
keld, had gone to request him to mediate between the 
Earl of Angus and the Earl of Arran. Though the latter, 
with his faction, was at the time within the palace, pre- 
paring for an immediate onslaught upon Angus and his 
followers ; and though, with the view of taking part in the 
bloody fray, the Archbishop had put on a suit of armour, 
which he concealed under his rochet, he replied, " Upon 
my conscience, my lord, I know nothing of the matter." 
To give emphasis to his words, after the manner of an 
orator, he struck his hand upon his breast. The iron 
corselet rattled beneath the rochet. It betrayed the 
liar ; giving Douglas, as he bowed and retired, an op- 
portunity of making this happy retort : " My lord," said 
he, using in clatters a Scotch word which means to tell 
tales, " My lord, your conscience clatters." 

But in the contrast between its ungodliness and former 
piety, my parish presented a contrast still more painful 
than that between its meanness and ancient splendour. 
It presented many, and not a few appalHng, cases of 
extreme misery. I have seen the dying lying all but 
naked, and had to buy blankets to cover them; the dead 
lying unburied, and had to buy a shell to coffin them ; 
whole families ravening tor food, and had to buy bread 
to feed them. Take this example as a case in point- 
one of the many which illustrate the saying, that one 



138 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

half of the world does not know how the other half live ; 
and which, often meeting the City Missionary, make his 
duties in some respects more trying than his who preaches 
the gospel to pagans with the virtues of savage, and few 
of the vices of civilised, life. The scene lay either in the 
Horse Wynd, where the Lady Galloway lived, about a 
century ago, who was wont to order out her carriage to 
pay a visit to some titled neighbour a few doors off; or 
in the College Wynd, up whose steep ascent some three 
hundred years ago Franciscans and Dominicans, priests 
and prelates, in long procession clomb with crozier and 
crucifix to the church of St. Mary's-in-the-Fields. In a 
bare room in one or other of these narrow streets I found 
a mother with four or five children. She looked utterly 
woe-begone ; and showed the hanging lip and watery eye 
they get who drink " to forget their poverty, and re- 
member their misery no more." A poor, withering, 
skeleton infant lay in her arms, with its sick head laid 
wearily on her naked shoulder ; the others stood around, 
staring at me out of their hollow eyes — theirs the sad- 
dened look of children who had never had a plaything in 
their hands, nor a smile on their faces. Disturbed, while 
si^eaking to her, by the wail and low mutterings of the 
creature on her bosom, I asked. What ails it — what is it 
saying? Whereupon the mother turned on it a look of 
unutterable tenderness, and bursting into tears, replied, 
It is crying for bread — and I have none ! They had not 
broken their fast that day. They were starving, I had 
read in the Bible, but had never seen a case before, of 
children who cried for bread and the ir mother had none 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 139 

to give them. Greatly shocked at the sight, I instantly, 
as the readiest way of supplying their wants, got in a 
loaf j and it was a feast to see the joy that lighted up 
their eyes at the sight of bread, and the eagerness with 
which each fell on his share — devouring it ravenously. 

Such as saw in these people those for whom Clirist 
died, and knew that man does not live by bread alone, 
but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of 
God, would have found a still greater want. It was 
more common to find families without Bibles than with 
them. Such was the utterly irreligious state into which 
they had sunk, that of the first 150 persons I visited not 
more than five, including Roman Catholics as well as 
Protestants, were in the habit of attending any place of 
worship — the more shame to those who did, and had 
left them to perish in their sins. I remember a whole 
day spent in going fi-om house to house, or rather from 
room to room, each usually housing one and sometimes 
two families, and being reminded, by the only Bible I 
saw, of these words of Whitefield; "I could write Damna- 
tion," said the bold orator, " in the dust which covers 
your Bibles ! " The room was occupied by a " cinder 
woman," as in Edinburgh they call those weird-looking 
creatures who prowl about the streets, late at night or at 
early morn, raking among the dust-heaps for cinders 
which they sell, for potatoes and bits of meat which they 
cat — with the chance of occasionally lighting on a gold 
ring or silver spoon. I found her literally sitting " in 
dust and ashes ; " floor, bed, table, chairs, all else, coated 
grey with them. She might have been fasting, but it 



I40 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

was not from sin ; for on rising to receive me when I 

introduced myself as the minister of the parish, she had 
great difficulty to keep her equilibrium. Though re- 
membering the proverb about casting pearls, I could 
not but hint at her habits. This at once set her up. 
She declared herself to be a very religious woman ; and, 
seeing me making for the door, insisted on my remain- 
ing to be convinced of that. Staggering across the room, 
she mounted a chair, from which I every moment ex- 
pected to see her tumble headlong on the floor, to thrust 
her arm to the back of a cupboard, and drag out a Bible. 
This she shook in my face and flourished over my head, 
sending out a cloud of dust from its rustling leaves. 
This Bible, in the hands of a drunken virago, was the 
only one I had seen that day ; and was it not sad to 
think that to any part of a city full of churches these 
words could be so justly applied, " Darkness covereth 
the earth, and gross darkness the people ?" 

It was not always so there. These houses present 
vestiges of piety more interesting still than the melan- 
choly relics of their old splendour; and could "the 
stone out of the wall and the beam out of the timber " 
speak, I can fancy them saying, " How is the gold 
become dim, how is the most fine gold changed ! " To 
say nothing of the feelings of a devout Roman Catholic, 
as (in a district where the Papists were such only in 
name) he read these words carved in stone — 

"Ave Maria, plena gratia, Dominus Tecum," 

it ^'as painful for me to contrast the nominal Protestants 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I4I 

there with those who built these houses, and who appear, 
by the inscriptions carved on Hntels of doors and win- 
dows, to have consecrated the very stone and lime to 
God. We read on one, "Be merciful to me, O God!" 
On another, " My trust is in the Lord." And a third 
raises this song of praise, " O magnifie the Lord with 
me, and let us exalt his name together ! " Ready 
to sink under the burden and heat of the day, I have 
felt revived on reading one of those blessed old texts : 
it was like coming on a spring that welled up beside a 
clump of palm-trees amid the desert's burning sands. 

We hope the world is growing better ; and that it is 
with the progress of society as yonder where, though each 
wave as it breaks on the beach rolls back to the sea, 
each, the billow of a flowing tide, breaks in front of that 
which preceded it. There is as much, if not more true 
religion in our age than in any bygone days. Still, 
though out of fashion, we like the old practice whereby, 
without intending to parade their piety, our fathers, by 
these Scripture texts, seemed to consecrate their houses ; 
and intimated that with the parent for high-priest, prayer 
and thanksgiving for the sacrifices,- and the family for 
worshippers, their dwellings should be holy temples to 
the Lord. A beautiful custom, it still survives in some 
parts of the Continent, and nowhere more than in a 
valley of Switzerland, which, following the course of the 
Visp as it rushes foaming from the glaciers of Monte 
Rosa, is inhabited by an exclusively Roman Catholic, 
but very sober, honest, devout, primitive race of people. 
In these quaint old hamletSj which stand amid flowery 



142 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

pastures at the feet of stupendous, snow-crowned moun- 
tains, I was often pleasantly reminded of the Cowgate 
and Edinburgh's ancient tenements. With that skill in 
wood-cutting for which they are famous, the Switzers 
had carved portions of Scripture on the great beams that 
supported their wooden ceilings, as well as on the fronts 
of their houses and the lintels of their doors. Perhaps 
in the dangers of their situation they found an aid to 
their devotion — whole villages there having been over- 
whelmed in a moment, and the church of St. Nicole, as 
I read on three tablets that stand above the rood screen, 
having been once destroyed by an earthquake, and twice 
beaten to the ground and buried beneath avalanches of 
snow. However that may be^ why should texts of Holy 
Scripture be regarded as suitable to the tombs of the 
dead, but out of place on the dwellings of the living? 
I sympathise with the taste and admire the courage of 
the late Sir Andrew Agnew, who had this appropriate 
sentence carved over the grand doorway of his castle at 
Lochnaw, "Except the Lord build the house, they labour 
in vain that build it : " and who does not feel fresh rever- 
ence for the memory of the late Prince Consort, when, 
standing before the Royal Exchange of London, he 
learns that it was the Prince who suggested the grand 
and appropriate words that he reads on its architrave — 
" The earth is the Lord's, and the fulness thereof 
Nothing is more offensive, or suspicious, than an os- 
tentatious parade of religion; but religion is never so 
healthy and true as when it gives its colour to all qui 
,acts, and, not confined to Sabbath-days, or churches, or 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I43 

special services, descends like dews from the womb of 
the morning, to bathe everything in its spirit ; or, work- 
ing like the great power-wheel of a manufactory, moves 
all the varied machinery of our daily life, while itself 
moved by influences from above. 

The most interesting associations connected with the 
district which my old parish partly embraced, belong to 
two buildings that still stand, and were in the olden time 
the centres of religious movements that have left an en- 
during impress on Scotland, and sent their waves to 
break on shores far removed from the place where the 
commotion originated. One is the Tailors' Hall, over 
nrhich stands an inscription more creditable certainly to 
jtie piety than the poetry of the craft : 

TO THE GLORE OF GOD AND VERTEWE's RENOWNE, 
THE CUMPANIE OF TAILYEORS WITHIN THIS GOOD TOWNE 
FOR MEETING OF THEIR CRAFT THIS HALL HAVE ERECTED 
WITH TRUST IN GOD's GOODNESS TO BE BLEST AND PROTECTED. 

Here in a building afterwards degraded into a Play 
House, and now turned into a Brewery, began that 
movement which in the term, the " Times of the Cove- 
nant," gave a distinctive appellation to the age, and 
ushered in that long, weary, deadly strife out of which our 
liberties came, bom of sufferings and baptised in blood. 
It was in this hall the Covenant was brought to light 
which in 1638 roused the country from Cape Wrath to 
Maiden Kirk, and placed Scotchmen, as the High- 
landers say, shoulder to shoulder on the field — nobles 
and commoners, ministers and laymen, binding them- 
•elves to stand together, and to the death for their faith 



144 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATl. 

and freedom. From this Hall, where the Earls of Lou- 
don and Rothes had held conference with a large body 
of ministers gathered from stormy isle, highland glen, 
and lowland plain, the Covenant, signed by 300 of them 
and by many chiefs of the nobility, was carried to the 
churchyard of the Grey Friars to be read in the hearing 
of the people, and boldly signed in the face of day. 
There it was signed by a great and enthusiastic multi- 
tude — some of whom nobly redeemed on scaffolds and 
battle-fields the pledge they took, when, not satisfied 
with ink, they opened a vein in their arms to fill the pen 
with blood. These circumstances invest the Cowgate, 
notwithstanding its present degradation, with associations 
hallowed to the great mass of Scotchmen, and should 
redeem it from contempt in the eyes even of such as 
cannot in conscience approve either of the principles or 
of the proceedings of the Covenanters. These involve 
points on which good Christians will differ, and have a 
right to differ. But now, when the passions of both 
parties have bad time to subside, it is generally admitted 
— David Hume i:imself admits it — that their struggles 
contributed to secure our civil and religious liberties, 
and that to the events which followed in their train, and 
culminated in the expulsion and permanent exclusion of 
a Popish family from the throne, our beloved country 
owes much of its prosperity, and happiness, and 
greatness. 

There remains one other building in the Cowgate to 
be noticed in this sketch. The Magdalene Chapel, to 
which I refer, is interesting to ecclesiastical antiquaries 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I4J 

as possessing in the royal arms of Scotland encircled 
with a wreath of thistles, and those of Mary ot Guise 
within a wreath of laurel, and those of the founder and 
foundress enclosed in ornamental borders, almost the 
only specimens which our country possesses of ancient 
glass-painting — an art which, with its dramatic scenes and 
** dim religious light," appears rather more suited to the 
genius and sensuous forms of Popery than to Protestant 
worship. Truth passes to the Roman Catholic through 
his priest, as the light of heaven to our eye through a 
stained-glass window; but Protestantism undertakes to 
pass it into the mind of man pure as it radiates from the 
Sun of Righteousness, uncoloured by the minister — like 
rays that permeate transparent glass. In employing this 
old art to ornament our churches, we should not forget 
that the power of a speaker over his audience depends 
in no small degree on his face, and the emotions it 
mirrors, being distinctly seen. Hence the footlights of 
the stage, to throw a glare on the actor's form and 
features. The children of this world are wise in their 
generation. Theatres are built for good sight and good 
hearing. How many churches are not? — stuck full of 
pillars, roaring with echoes, and God's light of day so 
dimmed and diminished in passing through painted win- 
dows that the Bible or Prayer-book is read with difficulty, 
the features of the preacher are lost, and he himself 
appears like a distant object looming through mist. 

Be that as it may, the Magdalene Chapel has features 
of deeper interest than those it owes, in the eyes of an- 
tiquaries, to its old glass windows. Here, in stonny 

L 



146 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

times, the cradle of the Reformation was rocked. Ori- 
ginally a Maison Dieu, it was restored from a state of 
decay in the reign of James V. by Michael Macquhen, a 
wealthy citizen of Edinburgh, and his pious widow. Her 
tomb still stands in the chapel, bearing this inscription in 
Gothic characters : — 

Heir lyis ane honorabil woman, Janet Rynd, y 
Spous of umquhil Micel Makquhen, burges 
Of Ed : founder of this place, and decessit y 
iiii day of Decern^ A*>. Dno. 1553. 

It was a Popish endowment, and as a specimen of 
Popery, here is a part of the original deed : — 

" Therefore wit ye me. To the praise and honowr of 
Almighty God, and of his Mother the Blissid Virgin 
Mary, and of Mary Magdallen, and of the haill celestial 
court * * * has dedicate the samen to the name of 
Mary Magdallen, and has foundit the said chaplain, and 
seven poor, for to give forth their continual prayers to 
God for the salvation of the soul of our most illustrious 
Mary Queen of Scots, and for the salvation of my said 
umquhil husband's soul and mine : And also for the 
salvation of our fathers and mothers," &c., &c. 

The widow's tomb has been respected. So let her 
memory be ! She lived in days when the dawning light 
of truth was struggling with the clouds and shadows of a 
long night of error. No wonder that she did not see 
things clearly ! Devout according to the measure of her 
knowledge, in the warm interest which she expresses in 
the salvation of souls, she rebukes the indifference of 
multitudes who live in better days and have incurred a 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, I47 

greater responsibility. Her head was wrong, but her 
heart was right; and while we entertain the deepest 
abhorrence of Popery, and with sleepless eyes should 
watch its aggressive and insidious movements, let us 
never forget that many, resting on the True Foundation, 
shall be saved, though they have all but buried it out of 
others' sight beneath a monstrous heap of " wood, and 
hay, and stubble." 

Only a few years after Janet R5aid enters the tomb 
where her ashes repose, the chapel is turned to purposes 
the foundress never contemplated — hers one of the 
many instances of the uncertainties of such endowments. 
For seven years have her chaplain and the poor men, 
with paternosters and ave-Marias, mumbled over their 
Latin prayers, as she directs, before " the blissid Mary 
Magdallen, with twa wax candles at the altar and twa at 
the foot of the image in twa brazen candlesticks, and twa 
wax torches, on the feast of the nativity of our Saviour, 
Pasch & Whitsunday, of the days of Mary Magdallen 
and of the days of the indulgences." At the end of this 
brief period the curtain rises, and other actors crowd the 
stage. The altar is removed ; the images are broken ; 
the candles are extinguished ; and the light of the sun, 
streaming in at the windows, falls no longer on tall black 
cross and gilded image, but on the pages of an open 
Bible, and an eager assembly of nobles, commoners, and 
ministers — many of the last from exile and prison. 
Raised above the crowd, and addressing them, stands 
the bearded figure of Knox, his eye kindling to the bold 
truths he utters, and his manly voice ringing over the 

L 2 



148 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

hall as he pronounces the doom on Babylon. Here, in 
fact, the first General Assembly of the Reformed Church 
of Scotland was held. Here, also, Craig, once a Domi- 
nican monk, and long a captive in the dungeons of the 
Inquisition at Rome, preached in Latin, having been so 
long abroad as to have forgotten his mother tongue. 
And here, likewise, the body of the Marquis of Argyll 
was borne fi'om the scaffold — to be waked by brave, 
pious women, and visited by many who, for a memorial 
of one that preferred his creed to his coronet and the 
truth to his Ufe, dipped in his blood handkerchiefs wet 
with honest tear& 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

III. — ^THE BLIND ORGANIST. 




T is little more than 200 years ago since Maiy 
Countess of Mar, and daughter of Esme Duke 
of Lennox, breathed her last in the Cowgate, 
in a house which stands opposite to the Magdalene 
Chapel, and still retains traces of bygone splendour. 
Very careful, as well as charitable and devout, was this 
countess, if we may judge from a household book of 
hers, of which these are extracts : — " 7th January, 1639. 
Given to the poor, at Nidries' Wynd-head, as my Laidy 
cam from the Treasurer depute's, 6 shillings." — " 1641. 
To the gardener in ye Abay Yard, who presentit, to my 
Laidy, ane flour (a flower), 6 shillings." — " i6th Septr. 
Payit for twa torches, to lighten on my Laidy to the 
Court, with my Laidy Marquesse of Huntlie, 24 shil- 
lings." — " 5th October. Yt day to ye Abay Kirk Broad 
(plate for offerings at the church door), as my Laidy 
went to the Sermon, 6 shillings." 

The Countess of Mar passed away, leaving few foot- 
prints behind her. Not so the builder of this once 



150 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

splendid mansion ; for here probably Sir Thomas Hope, 
its builder, who was King's Advocate, though one of the 
principal opponents of Charles I.'s schemes, organised 
the opposition which ended in the melancholy death of 
his royal master and the overthrow of his throne. In 
course of time, counts and countesses deserted the Cow- 
gate. Yet it appears to have sunk very gradually into its 
present meanness; for Dr. Chalmers used to tell that, 
when he was young, he attended a grand rout there, and 
I myself was present at the funeral obsequies of its long- 
decaying respectability. Part of the same mansion where 
politicians hatched the schemes which cost a king his 
head and an ancient d5masty their sceptre, was occupied 
by a member of my congregation. There, and thereby a 
distinguished person in the Cowgate, she had a front 
door opening on the street, occupying what is called in 
Edinburgh " a self-contained house." A genty bodie, as 
they say in Scotland, she carried her head high among 
her neighbours ; and lived within her green front door, 
which was distinguished by a knocker and her name on 
a bright brass plate, very much apart from them. The 
old lady at length died ; and we buried her, agreeably to 
her death-bed instructions, with honours that astonished 
the natives of the Cowgate. She was borne away to the 
churchyard in a capacious hearse stuck all over with 
nodding plumes, and followed by a train of mourning 
coaches, as well as cortege of ragged bairns who had 
never seen such a grand sight before. Accustomed as I 
had been to regard this old lady with her green painted 
front door, and its bright brass plate and knocker, and 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I5I 

the flowers in the sills of her windows, as the only living, 
though decayed, representative of the Cowgate's ancient 
gentility, the last gleam of its glory seemed to have gone 
out with her breath ; and as we moved off to the church- 
yard I could not but say with some sadness, *' There goes 
the last of the Romans ! " Caesar said, I would rather 
be first in my own village, than second at Rome ; and 
with some such ambition perhaps my worthy friend pre- 
ferred the importance which her house and wealth gave 
her in the Cowgate to a very secondary position in gen- 
teel parts of the town ; or, her remaining in that locality 
may have been due to such attachments as make the 
Highlander weep to leave his smoky cabin and misty 
glen, or a half-fed native of our Hebrides cling to his 
stormy isle with the tenacity of the shell-fish to its 
rocks. In such ties let us observe how kindly God 
has provided for our happiness; since, lacking these, 
many, ever shifting, would be the rolling stones that 
gather no moss, and thousands, who are so, would 
cease to be happy in situations which all but themselves 
regard as wretched. 

In this house, and in the neighbouring tenements, I 
was engaged one day in the work of ministerial visitation. 
I had worn well through the working hours, but had met 
little else than sights of dirt, poverty, and misery, in all 
shapes and forms. In one large building, swarming with 
inhabitants, I hardly found a family who enjoyed the 
ordinary comforts of life, or made any profession of reli- 
gion. It was depressing, I may say, heart-breaking 
work. Saddened and wearied, and wearied because sad- 



153 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

dened, I at length opened a door, to be as much as- 
tonished as the traveller when he lights on an oasis — 
green grass, corn-fields, bubbling springs, and tall waving 
palms — amid the desert sands. The door opened on an 
apartment lighted by windows whole and clean, neither 
patched with paper, nor stuffed with rags, nor crusted 
with dirt like bottles of old wine ; a floor white with 
washing, and sprinkled with yellow sand, stretched to 
the fireplace, where the flames, reflected from shining 
brasses, danced merrily in the grate over a well-swept 
hearth-stone. Toasting on a screen hung a pair of Eng- 
lish blankets in ample folds ; the furniture, polished like 
a mirror, gleamed in the light of the cheerful fire, and 
around the whitewashed walls hung a variety of neatly- 
framed prints and pictures. The room had an aspect of 
tidiness and comfort pleasant to see anywhere, but there 
surprising. And I remember, as if it were yesterday, 
though it is now five-and-twenty years ago, of saying to 
myself before I had crossed the threshold or asked 
one question, This is the house of a church-going 
family ! So it proved to be. It was a Bethel ; God 
was in that place ; and though, like the patriarch, 
I was in a sort of wilderness, this pleasant sight was 
a reality — no vision, like the ladder and angels of his 
dream. 

Those who knew Edinburgh some five-and-twenty years 
ago, may recollect an old blind man with a face firightfiiUy 
scarred by small-pox, and his grey head swathed in yards 
of flannel, who sat the livelong day at the top of the 
Mound, grinding music, of a kind, firom a barrel-organ. 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I53 

He and his wife, a decent couple, belonged to my 
Church ; and how pleased was I to find that this bright, 
comfortable room, was the organist's home. Blind 
among neighbours who laboured under no such dis- 
advantage and deprivation, his was the only house there 
where dirt might have been excused, and signs of poverty 
expected. It was remarkable by their absence. And 
the key to this material difference lay in the moral differ- 
ence between him and his neighbours. They never 
went to church ; he did. They had no respect for the 
Sabbath; he kept it holy to the Lord. They had no 
religion ; he was a man of devout habits. They indulged 
their vices ; he practised the virtues of Christianity. So, 
even in this world, his religion was of more advantage to 
him than their eyes were to them. It made him careful, 
and frugal, and temperate. Thus, though his only means 
of maintenance was the charity of such Samaritans as did 
not pass by on the other side, he lived amid comfort to a 
good old age, and left behind him at his death, not only 
the memory of an honest and upright life, but moneys in 
the bank not very much short of 200/. Well, therefore, 
as I left the house, might I feel a strong desire to chalk, 
for his neighbours to " read, mark, learn, and inwardly 
digest," this appropriate sentence on the blind man's 
door, " Godliness is profitable unto all things, having 
promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to 
come." 

^sop's Fables have their moral; and such is the 
moral I would draw from this veritable story. The 
aphorism of the Apostle is open, no doubt, to excep- 



154 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

tions ; but exceptions here, as elsewhere, prove nothing ; 
or, if anything, the rule. Once in a century, as it was 
or might have been in 1796, when the thermometer sank 
to 48° below the freezing point, the Thames is frozen 
over, and London roasts oxen and holds fairs on the ice. 
Once in a century there is such a fall of snow as hap- 
pened in 1824, when the mail-coach did not run for 
weeks, and a dead farmer on the borders of my old 
parish lay above ground for a fortnight, although the dis- 
tance between his house and the churchyard was not 
over two statute miles. Once in a century our heat is 
almost tropical, as in 1826, when every crop but wheat 
failed ; vines ripened their grapes in the open air ; and, 
lighted perhaps by shepherds shaking out the ashes of 
their tobacco pipes, such fires burned among the dry 
moss and heath of the Grampians that, as I remember 
well, they seemed a range of active volcanoes — vast 
clouds of smoke rolling down their sides by day, and 
tremendous fires blazing on their tops by night. Such 
seasons are quite abnormal ; and, notwithstanding their 
occasional occurrence, ours is justly reckoned a temperate 
climate, alike happily removed from the torrid heat of 
India and the wintry rigours of Labrador. Now as 
much as these intensely hot summers and severe winters 
are exceptions to the generally mild character of our 
climate, as much is every case of extreme destitution, 
among the virtuous and pious, an exception to the or- 
dinary course of God's providence and government of 
the world. In ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, if not 
in nine hundred and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand. 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I55 

godliness, as He has ordained, works out the results de- 
scribed by Paul; and so, as many a grey-headed man on 
the banks of the Thames could say, " I have been young 
and am now old, but I never saw its waters frozen, or its 
ships locked fast in ice ; " so the Psalmist said, as many 
else could say, " I have been young and now am old, yet 
I never saw the righteous forsaken, or his seed begging 
bread." Unlike the stars in their courses, or the tides 
in their ebb and flow, the weather and the wind, which 
" bloweth where it listeth," seem often quite capricious. 
Yet there are causes, did we know them, to account for 
this summer being unusually warm, and that winter un- 
usually cold. But, originating in remote quarters of the 
earth, or acting in the higher regions of the atmosphere, 
or belonging perhaps to the sun, whose spots are sup- 
posed to exert a marked influence on our seasons, they lie 
beyond our ken. But it is not usually so with those 
cases which seem exceptions to the Apostle's rule. All 
good people are not wise. There may be devotion with- 
out discretion ; saintship, but little common sense ; and 
an examination of those cases where piety is associated 
with poverty and does not succeed in the world, will 
often discover such peculiarities of circumstances, body, 
mind, talents, or temper, as sufficiently explain why god- 
liness, amid their disturbing influences, is not profitable 
for the life that now is, however profitable it is for that 
which is to come. 

One of the grand practical principles of our religion is 
self-denial. " If any man," said our Lord, " will be my 
disciple, let him take up his cross, deny himself daily, 



156 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

and follow me." And since this virtue lies at the foun- 
dation of success in every business and pursuit, what 
more evident than that the godliness which forms and 
fosters it, must be profitable for the life that now is, as 
well as for that which is to come ? The religion which 
enforces, and by Divine example teaches, habits of self- 
denial, arms a man for doing battle with the temptations 
that beset his path. It teaches him to say. No ! — to 
sacrifice his passions to his interests ; and abstain from 
those indulgences which, wasting time, squandering 
money, impairing health, injuring character, lead to re- 
sults that, though often attributed to misfortune, are 
usually due to misconduct. In a hundred other cases 
besides those where a woman who has fallen from virtue 
speaks of it as a misfortune^ the term is incorrectly 
applied. It is not to the freaks of fortune, but to their 
own folly, their silly pride, their imprudence, their bad 
temper, their recklessness, their want of foresight, or 
their unwillingness to deny themselves a present pleasure 
for some future good, that the poverty and privations of 
numbers are due. The Bible tells us of only one pious 
man who was a beggar — and the diseases of his body 
are sufficient to account for the poverty of his circum- 
stances — and virtue soliciting charity is still a rare spec- 
tacle in the good providence of God. No doubt, I have 
had as many applying for work, or clothes, or money, or 
food, as would have filled a church much bigger than my 
own ; yet though I cannot say of those whose misfor- 
tunes were not due to their misconduct, as a minister 
said of his friends as distinguished from his acquaint- 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I57 

ances, that my pulpit would hold them all, they formed 
a small percentage of the whole. 

The blind organist teaches what prudence and temper- 
ance can achieve ; and though stagnations in trade will 
occur to press on the resources and try the patience of 
the working classes, early and steady habits of self-denial 
would exempt them from many of the humiliations and 
privations they suffer. And I am sorry they ever suffer : 
I should like to see every man who has earned his 
honest bread, and contributed by his labour to the 
wealth of the country, in circumstances, when his head 
is grey, and his eyes are dim, and his joints are stiff, to 
live like the bees in winter. Provident, they " improve 
each shining hour ; " and, snug within their warm thatch, 
enjoy the fruits of self denying and frugal industry when 
summer flowers lie withered, and winter frosts bite keenly. 
Alas ! that many of our working-people should doom 
themselves to toil on till they sink into the grave ; or 
till, amid privations and infirmities that gather about 
their grey heads like clouds around a setting sun, they 
have to accept the bitter bread of charity, and at an age 
when transplanting suits them as ill as it suits a hoary 
tree, are torn up by the roots and removed to the dreary 
walls of a Poor-House, — to be nursed, when dying, by 
hirelings, and thrust, when dead, into a pauper's grave. 
He surely is the best friend of domestic servants, day- 
labourers, artisans, and their class, who seeks to save 
them from such a fate ; and shows them, as I undertake 
to do, that they may ensure themselves against it 
Nothing more simple if they only would practise % 



I5S SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

measure of that self-denial which has raised not a few 
of their class to fame and fortune. In the hope that 
some of my readers may catch inspiration from the 
stories, let me give a few illustrations. 

I lately met with a remarkable instance of this virtue 
in a book called " The Reformers before the Reforma- 
tion." One of these — a witty man, who seriously denied 
that the Apostle Peter ever enjoined eating fish on Friday, 
but jocularly asserted that, if he did, it was with an eye 
to his trade ; and a bold man, who thundered away at 
the gates of Rome before either Luther or Calvin was 
bom — ^was reared in a monastic Institution. There, 
however it fared with the Heads of the House, the 
pupils had little else to eat than vegetables dressed 
with oil. Too poor to purchase lights to read books, 
when others slept, this ardent youth, to meet and over- 
come that difficulty, denied himself the pleasures and, to 
some extent, the benefits of the table. He robbed his 
body to enrich his mind. He made his dinner of the 
vegetables — reserving the oil to feed the lamp by which 
he lighted his lonely cell, and pursued his studies through 
the long hours of night. 

Another case, which occurred in Edinburgh and fell 
under my own observation, offers a remarkable example 
of the benefits and, indeed, triumphs of a determined, 
steady self-denial. It was the misfortune, not the fault, 
of the girl whose case I refer to, that she began her life 
as Lazarus ended his, — a beggar. She was born in that 
lot ; and her circumstances were not her shame. But in 
conquering fortune through an iron will, the sternest 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 1 59 

virtue, daily, noble, heroic self-denial, she presented in 
a, humble sphere a truly grander spectacle than "-he 
heavens when the sun, coming forth as a bridegroom 
and rejoicing as a strong man to run his race, scatters 
the clouds that obscure his rising. I knew this girl well; 
and was first led to notice her by her singularly intelli- 
gent face, the modesty of her demeanour, and the clean, 
tidy aspect she offered as she sat, day by day, " at the 
receipt of custom." It was nothing to see her sit where 
many swept past, saying, "Oh, these beggars are a 
nuisance ! " and some with kindly word or look dropped 
an alms into her hand. Before our Ragged Schools were 
opened such a spectacle was too common. But nothing 
was so uncommon as the use she made of a mendicant's 
hard-earned gains, — more than redeeming her poverty 
jfrom contempt, and swimming in circumstances where 
most would have sunk. She fought a good fight ; and 
displayed a truer heroism than the world has often graced 
with titles, and crowned with laurels. Beggar-girls — and 
no wonder — usually come to grief; go to ruin ; and find 
a deep lower still. But so soon as night fell on the 
streets she rose from her post, often cold, and wet, and 
weary, to turn her steps to an evening school. There, 
paying for education out of her gains, she learned to 
read, to write to count, to sew. She grew expert at her 
needle, and, devouring books with insatiable avidity, be- 
came in many respects a remarkable scholar. Without 
entering more fully into her case, suffice it to say, that 
the poor beggar-lassie entered on a life of credit and 
usefulness and independence more romantic than many 



l6o SKETCHES OF THE COWGATB. 

novels, — she who began life in the lowest obscurity, soon 
rising to the surface, and riding like a life-buoy on the 
top of the waves. In my experience of all classes, from 
the highest to the lowest, I never knew one to whom 
these words might have been more justly applied, " Many 
daughters have done virtuously, but thou excellest them 
all." 

Another, and no less remarkable example of the self- 
denying spirit without which genius and talent often go 
for nothing, is found in the history of one of our greatest 
engineers. He began life as the only son of a poor 
widow, and after being a herd-boy was apprenticed to a 
country blacksmith. He says, as I have been told, that 
till he was over twenty years of age he never spent one 
copper penny he could save. In vain did public-houses, 
fairs, and markets spread their snares around him. Ex- 
cellent pattern for youth to copy, he drank no drams, 
and smoked no tobacco. Having to choose between 
himself wanting the luxuries and his mother wanting the 
necessaries of life, or accepting them as a pauper, he 
chose the better part. He supported her out of his 
wages ; and besides that, when his fellows repaired 
perhaps to the public-house, each evening he left the 
forge, where he had toiled ten long hours, to learn mathe- 
matics from a country schoolmaster who lived miles 
away. That lad, with begrimed face washed clean, a 
copy of Euclid in one horny hand and a good staff in 
the other, tramping foul roads and facing winter storms 
in pursuit of knowledge, lovingly holding up a widowed 
mother with one arm, and with the other stoutly pulling 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. l6l 

his way up the ladder, offered a spectacle not only for 
men to imitate, but for angels to admire. He deserved 
to succeed, and did succeed — his the living sacrifices, 
which God regards with approbation and crowns with 
victory. 

Toiling — rejoicing — sorrowing, 

Onward through life he goes ; 
Each morning sees some task begun. 

Each evening sees its close ; 
Something attempted, something done, 

Has earned a night's repose ! 
Thanks, thanks to thee, my worthy friend. 

For the lesson thou hast taught ! 
Thus at the flaming forge of life 

Our fortune must be wrought, 
Thus on its soimding anvil shaped 

Each burning deed and thought I 

Deny thyself daily! Let men observe that Christian 
precept, and what comforts would be secured, what evils 
shunned ! Could I persuade all the working-classes to 
deny themselves those stimulants only which they would 
be no worse but much better to want, how many more of 
chem might pass the evening of life in the pleasant en- 
joyment of this world, and in undisturbed, devout pre- 
paration for the next ! Instead of drudging on to the 
last, or becoming dependent either on public or private 
charity, how much better to find themselves in the cir- 
cumstances of a venerable friend whom, after missing for 
years, I encountered lately as he sauntered the streets on 
a bright, balmy day ? He had nothing to do but enjoy 
himself. Steady work, prudence, and foresight were 
cheering his old age with the comforts of this life, and 



l69 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

piety with the hopes of a better one ; and I shall not 
forget his answer to my question, nor how his counte- 
nance grew radiant with the sunshine of his heart as he 
replied on my asking him^ How he was? — "I have 
had a long day, and now I have a quiet evening." 
A long day and a quiet evening ! What are these but 
the natural fruits, in the common course of Providence, 
of such a life of temperance and self-denial as religion 
inculcates ? 

This can be demonstrated. I have made extensive 
enquiries; and feel perfect confidence in asserting that 
foresight and frugality would place our people, save in a 
few exceptional cases, beyond the reach of want or the 
need of charity. It is the want of these which makes 
Poor Laws necessary — if they are necessary. To make 
this plain, observe that he reckons himself, and is 
reckoned by others, a moderate and sober man, whose 
outlay for tobacco, ales, and spirits does not exceed, and 
cannot be counted at less, than from one to three pounds 
a year. Thousands of workmen spend twice three pounds 
a year on these indulgences. Now whether spent by 
servant girls to gratify their love of finery, or by men to 
gratify their appetite for stimulants, they should know 
that these pounds, with accumulated capital and interest 
at five per cent., would in the course of years amount to 
a sum of money sufficient to maintain them, in comfort- 
able and honest independence, throughout the evening 
of life. Some may not believe, and many may not 
understand this. The explanation lies in this, that 
nothing grows like money. Disease blights the potato; 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I63 

Storms shake, and rains drown, and frosts kill the com ; 
flowers go to sleep at night, and trees, ceasing to grow, 
rest through the winter; but night and day, in freezing 
cold and burning drought, money grows. For example : 
il. a, year, laid by for forty years, and bearing interest at 
5 per cent., grows at the end of that period, not to 40?., 
but to lool. ; 3?. to 300?. ; $1. to 500?. Saving at one 
or other of these rates, how many who come to actual 
want would find themselves in old age equally inde- 
pendent of work and charity ? Besides, they would have 
the comfort of knowing that their death would not plunge 
any who might be dependent on them into want. Able 
thus to give to them that need, and provide for them- 
selves and those of their house, they would set forth the 
" Genius of Christianity," and adorn the doctrine of God 
their Saviour. 

It is even-handed justice to say, that others besides the 
working-classes are wanting in the virtues of self-denial ; 
and that though self-indulgence on the part of the upper 
classes may inflict a less injury on the public, it inflicts a 
much greater one on their families. When the children 
of working men are left destitute, they find it compara- 
tively easy to earn their bread and fight their own battle. 
The ability to do so rises as we descend in the scale of 
society. With faculties early sharpened on the grind- 
stone of necessity, the ragged urchins of the Cowgate, 
for example, are more acute and awake at five years than 
other children are at eight or ten, — reminding one of the 
Polynesians, who, earned out to sea on their mothers' 
backs and tossed in, have to struggle for life, and thus 

M a 



164 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

learn to swim before other infants have learned to walk. 
It is the upper and middle classes who sin most in leaving 
their families destitute ; and it would be difficult to find 
language strong enough to condemn the conduct of those 
who, living up to or beyond their means, leave children, 
they have never trained to earn their bread, to the unut- 
terable horrors of genteel poverty. 

Self-denial, a duty incumbent on all, is incumbent 
especially on such as make a profession of religion. I 
know that events, which they could neither anticipate 
nor avoid, occur to plunge those into want whom, as the 
excellent of the earth, one would account the special 
objects of divine care. Such cases deserve our tenderest 
sympathy; and in these, besides yielding the pleasure 
common to every act of kindness, charity rises into some- 
thing sublime. On withdrawing from scenes where we 
have ministered to the necessities of Christ's suffering 
members, we have seemed to hear the Divine voice, 
which said, " I was sick, and ye visited me ; naked, and 
ye clothed me ; I was an hungered, and ye gave me 
meat ; thirsty, and ye gave me drink." But if stem and 
heroic self-denial can make him independent, no man 
who regards his Master's honour and the character of 
religion should allow himself to become dependent on 
charity — to eat a morsel he has not earned, or inherited. 
On passing the gate of our City Workhouse when they 
were admitting applicants or dispensing out-door relief, I 
have grieved to see poor, decent Christians mixed up 
v;ith a crowd who bore on their backs the rags, and in 
their bloated faces the stamp, of vice. And as I saw 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I65 

God's children herded with such characters and in such 
circumstances as seemed to bring discredit on the care of 
their Heavenly Father, I felt that the self-denial which 
makes man independent of charity was a great Chi istian 
duty; and that in the practice of this virtue, as in a 
thousand other ways, he who would not seem to deny 
his Master, must deny himself. The tree is known by 
its fruit j and let Christians endeavour to recommend 
religion by such fruits as an ungodly world can appre- 
ciate and understand. A higher patriotism this than the 
bluff, honest Englishman recommended ! His aid had 
been asked by one who, from the other's well-known 
wealth and generosity, reckoned on a favourable answer. 
He reckoned without his host. His application was met 
with a firm and flat refusal. Then, said the ni er-do-well^ 
changing the whining tone to insolence, " I'll lie down in 
the road there, and die before your door!" "Quite 
right, quite right," coolly replied the other ; " I approve 
of that. Every man should do something for his country. 
Go, sir, and die, and let the world see the end of a 
drunkard ! " The story, which I tell as it was told to 
me, presents truth — ^like the diamond in its natural state 
— in a rough form. Yet in the respectability and com- 
forts which self-denial secures for such as practise it, who 
would not rather see the rewards of virtue, the pleasant 
fruits of piety ? However humble his lot, he, as a pa- 
triot, does something for his country, and as a Christian, 
much for his religion, who shows by his circumstances, 
that, while vice is costly, virtue is cheap; that worth and 
want are not ordinarily linked together in the government 



l66 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

of God ; that, as Scripture teaches, the blind old organist 
illustrated, and the experience of ages proves, Godliness 

IS PROFITABLE UNTO ALL THINGS, HAVING THE PROMISE 
OF THE LIFE THAT NOW IS, AND OF THAT WHICH 18 TO 
OOMIi 




SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

IV. THE ORPHAN. 

IS very disheartening !" said a lady to me on 
closing the sad story of a girl whom she had 
done much to save. This girl was possessed 
of no ordinary personal attractions^ and a winning man- 
ner. The flower of a Highland glen which had been 
flung on the streets when its bloom was gone, she had 
awakened a very tender interest in the heart of my kind, 
good friend. The latter found her in a reformatory into 
which she had run for refuge ; and where her conduct 
had won the good opinion both of its visitors and in- 
mates. When it was considered safe for her to leave 
this quiet harbour, and once more face the temptations 
and trials of life, this lady undertook to provide her with 
a situation, and an outfit. At her solicitation, an excel- 
lent and kind-hearted acquaintance of hers agreed to 
receive this girl as a domestic servant Everything pro- 
mised well. Her character was not blown in the quarter 
where she was going ; for her history, though confided to 
the mistress, was kept a secret from every one else-. The 



l68 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

house that opened its door to her, offered a safe asylum. 
The home of virtue, she would breathe a pure atmo- 
sphere there ; and removed by hundreds of miles from 
Edinburgh, be separated from her old associates and 
associations. Besides, she would find, in full and regular 
work, one of the best safeguards of virtue ; there being 
no truer saying than the quaint old adage, " The devil 
tempts every man, but an idle man tempts the devil." 
With such prospects, the lady, after loading her with 
kindnesses, and rigging her out, so to speak, saw her one 
fine summer-day come forth, and sail away amid prayers 
and hopes of a prosperous voyage. Alas ! after some 
time, the post brought sad tidings. A wreck again ! 
Vanity, the besetting sin, and ruin of so many young 
people — lying, a habit which becomes so inveterate in 
those fallen ones, that it is hardly safe to believe one 
word they say — these and other vices, which need not 
be specified, had broken out afresh. The improvement 
wrought in the reformatory was just what pitch and paint 
make on a shattered hulk. Concealed rather than closed, 
the gaping seams give way before the strain of the first 
gale; the sea rushes in; the ship, becoming water-logged, 
refuses to obey her helm, and, foundering, goes to the 
bottom. So happened it in this case ; and no wonder 
that the lady, seeing her anxious efforts all defeated, her 
fairest hopes blasted, should, as she finished the story, 
fall back in her chair, lift up her hands, and exclaim, 
'*'Tis very disheartening ! " 

From time to time, God be thanked, cases occur to 
show that none are to be despaired of. If we but knew 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 1 69 

what a tough battle these poor creatures have to fight 
with the devil, the world and the flesh, and sufficiently- 
reflected on the difficulty of turning the course either of 
a river or of a life out of its old channel, we should be 
less easily cast down. Why forget that Rome was not 
built in a day ? even where there was no mass of ruins to 
clear away and increase the difficulty. In Christ-like 
attempts to reclaim the vicious and raise the fallen many 
do nothing ; some do little ; but others, in a way, do, or 
at least attempt to do, too much. Were greater care be- 
stowed, and a longer guardianship exercised over a fewer 
number, our efforts would be more satisfactory, and suc- 
cessful. The true guardian angels of life are not reli- 
gious knowledge, or some heartfelt and sincere appre- 
ciation of divine truth, but confirmed principles ; and till 
the principles of the fallen have had time to grow con- 
firmed, how can they be expected to withstand the temp- 
tations to which, on leaving reformatories, prisons, or 
asylums, they are necessarily exposed? — all the more 
when we consider that many who leave the paths of 
virtue to lead a life of sin, are constitutionally soft and 
facile j as ready to take any shape, mould, or form, as a 
piece of dough 

When men transplant grown trees, what pains are 
taken to keep them erect till they become well-rooted 
and catch a firm hold ! Stakes are driven into the 
ground ; to these lopes moor the tree, and by such arti- 
ficial stays It is secured and supported till strong new 
roots anchor it to the soil. In dealing even with cases 
where there has been a real change of heart, we may 



lyo SKETCHES OF THE COWGATK. 

leam good lessons from the art of the forester ; or from 
the mason, who leaves the wooden centres below the 
arch till the cement gripes, and, locking the separate 
stones together, gives them the strength of one. Did we 
reflect on our own proneness to fall into what the Apostle 
calls besetting sins, we would expect less of poor human 
nature j and, more ready to excuse the failings of others, 
we would be more careful to guard them from tempta- 
tion. To the neglect of this on the part of parents, of 
masters, and still more of mistresses, is due the ruin of 
many children and servants, as well as the relapse of 
some whose cases are pronounced disheartening. Think 
of a lady who had received one of our ragged-school 
boys into her service, when she sent her silver spoons to 
have her crest cut on them, sending them by this boy's 
hands — entrusting them to his charge ! No wonder she 
never saw either him or her spoons again. How much 
better was human nature understood by him who, seated 
within hearing but not sight, on sending a boy into his 
garden to gather gooseberries, insisted on his whistling 
all the time he was plucking ! 

In following Christy walking in the footprints of Him 
who went about doing good, the cases that dishearten 
one most are not such as I have related ; but those 
where we have been imposed upon, or stung by ingrati- 
tude. And some are very clever, as well as unscrupulous, 
imposters. There lived, for instance, in a back room of 
a great pile of buildings in the Cowgate, a lonely old 
woman, who received many kind attentions from a friend 
of mine. It was his habit on the Sabbath-day to pass 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, If I 

the mtervai between the forenoon and afternoon services 
111 reading the Scriptures and praying with her ; and so 
tavourable an impression did her conduct and conver- 
sation make on him that, in the beHef that she was one 
ot God's poor ones, he cheerfully bore the burden of sup- 
plying almost all her wants. At length she died. The 
lamp, which he had regarded as a light shining in a dark 
place, went out — but not to leave behind it the fragrance 
ot a sweet perfume, the odour of sanctity. Her poverty 
ana her piety were a pretence and a lie. A hoard of 
money was found beside the corpse ; and no better actor 
ever trode the boards of a theatre than lay there — in that 
old, dead, withered, wicked woman. Irish beggars 
drown one with a shower of blessings; the Scotch, 
though less demonstrative, are ready with their thanks ; 
buty completely taking in my friend, this old crone, on 
receiving the crowns or half-crowns which dropped from 
his hand, made no fuss about his kindness. She thanked 
him j but not till she appeared, by a silent prayer and 
upturned look, to acknowledge the goodness of Him 
whose almoner she recognised in the kind gentleman 
that supplied her wants. Horribly wicked and profane^ 
this was shrewdly calculated for my friend's unpretending 
disposition and Christian modesty; and being a sin- 
gularly genuine and transparent, though a clever, man. 
he was completely taken in. 

It was my sad, rather than good, fortune to detect as 
bad a case ; but before death had dropped the curtain 
on the actor and the stage. It may have been well for 
the poor sinner that it happened so, lest she also had 



<T» SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 



gone to judgment with a lie in her right hand. Before 
the great fire in 1824, there were houses in Edinburgh 
which rose to the height of fifteen storeys. Some stDl 
remain that are eleven, and many that are six and seven 
storeys. It was up in one of these, in a room very poor and 
disorderly, breathing air close and noisome, surrounded 
by children sallow and ragged, that I found a mother lying 
— bedrid. Though thankful to have her temporal wants 
relieved, she appeared to take the deepest interest in what 
concerned her soul ; and as the weary days and nights 
were spun out on that bed, a gracious work seemed to be 
going on within her ; a hopeful preparation for the hour 
when she would exchange that poor dwelling for a man- 
sion in glory. On visiting her, I had never to ask for a 
Bible ; far less, as in some other cases, to see this drawer, 
and that cupboard searched, before one was forthcoming- 
Hers was always at hand, on the bed, by her pillow. 
After my visits had continued for awhile, it struck me as 
strange that all our alms seemed to make no change for 
the better in her house, but passed away like water 
poured on thirsty sand. Was it possible that she was 
addicted to drinking ; and that the peculiar odour of her 
breath, which I felt when once bending over her it 
prayer, was due to this ? I was alarmed ; for I had 
learned by this time to scent out the cursed vice — not- 
withstanding the peppermint, onions, and other such like 
things which tipplers chew to hide it But the suspicion 
was so painfiil, it implied such shocking profanity on the 
part of this poor woman, that I dismissed it. Thus mat- 
ters went on ; till, on entering the room one day without 



SKETCHES OF THB COWGATE. 173 

knocking, my suspicions returned on seeing her suddenly 
thrust something under the pillow. She looked caught ; 
was ill at ease ; and betrayed in her face fears which she 
vainly attempted to conceal. I was determined, if pos- 
sible, to be at the bottom of the affair. So when her 
daughter, a little girl, left the room, as if too hurried that 
day to remain and pray with her, I also left ; and follow- 
ing close on the girl's heels, caught her half-way down- 
stairs. To save the child from the temptation of telling 
a lie, I assumed, on questioning her, that her mother did 
drink; and though the creature — my heart the while 
bleeding for her — fenced and equivocated somewhat, 
enough came out to make me retrace my steps. On re- 
turning, I went right up to the bed ; and, without a word 
of explanation, thrusting my hand under the pillow where 
the Bible lay, I pulled out and held up a whiskey bottle ! — 
the black idol to which this wretched woman was sacri- 
ficing our charity, her own children, both her body and 
soul, with a pretence of piety inexpressibly shocking. It 
was a painful discovery to us both ; but most felt perhaps 
by me who suddenly saw all my hopes shattered — as the 
bottle would have been, had I, yielding to my first impulse, 
dashed it to shivers on the floor. I pitied the mother 
and her miserable children too much to shake off the 
dust of my feet against her — all angry feelings at this 
gross imposture being lost in the death, and buried in 
the grave of my cherished hopes ; but no wonder that, 
as I descended the stair, and took my sad, weary way 
home, I should have been heard to fay, " 'Tis very dis- 
heartening 1 " 



174 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

As if he himself had met many such disappointments, 
and felt and feared their tendency to harden the heart, 
the Apostle says, "Be not weary in well-doing" — 
a needless exhortation, if generosity were never wounded 
by ingratitude, nor our efforts to do good foiled and frus- 
trated. Nor let us shut up our bowels of compassion 
against the poor, as if the vices of selfishness and ingrati- 
tude were peculiar to them. The serpent that stings the 
bosom which warms it into life, is bred elsewhere than in 
the Cowgate, and such humble localities. I have known 
instances of ingratitude among a higher class, which the 
denizens of the Cowgate would hear of with astonish- 
ment, and regard with contempt. It has been elsewhere, 
never among them, that I have seen a benefactor pulled 
down by those whom he had generously supported — his 
cruel fate, that of a wall which had screened and suc- 
coured the tender shoots of an ambitious plant. Cling- 
ing to every point of support, they clomb upward ; thrust 
themselves into every opening, and wormed their way 
into its heart ; but it was, as they grew, to rend the 
kindly wall asunder, and, offering their rank foliage as a 
purchase to the storm, to hurl to the ground what had 
nursed their infancy and sustained their weakness. 

Apart from these considerations, who that reflects on 
his own ingratitude to God will not learn to expect and 
bear with it when others show it to himself? What 
are all the kindnesses which we appear to have thrown 
away on them to those God has showered down on us — 
to do us no apparent good, nor 3deld Him any suitable 
return ? How should it fare with the best of us, *were 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 175 

He provoked, by our abuse of them, to withdraw or with- 
hold His mercies 1 Who sins against us as we sin 
against Him 1 Yet, though we are daily crucifying His 
Son and grieving His Spirit, He is " not weary in well- 
doing " — enforcing, as well by His divine example as by 
His divine authority, the gracious words of Jesus : " Love 
your enemies; do good to them that hate you; bless 
them which curse you ; pray for them which de spitefully 
use you — as you would that men should do to you, do 
also to them likewise, and your reward shall be great, 
and ye shall be the children of the Highest ; for He is 
kind to the unthankful and the evil.'' 

** Blessed is he that wisely doth 
The poor man's case consider," 

So run the opening words of the 41st Psalm, in the 
Scotch version. Wisely? He wisely considers the case 
of the poor who, wherever it is possible, supplies them 
with work rather than money ; who helps them to help 
themselves, who encourages them to self-exertion, and 
teaches them self-respect ; who patronises not indolence 
but industry, not the intemperate but the sober ; who ap- 
plies his money to relieve the misfortunes that come 
from the hand of Providence, rather than such as are the 
divinely ordained and salutary penalties of vice. And 
who thus goes to the work of Christian benevolence will 
meet with many cases to cheer him on, and keep him up 
to this mark, " Be not weary of well-doing." 

For a beautiful illustration of this let us go down to 
the Cowgate ; and, entering a low-browed close, climb 



176 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

the stair of one of its picturesque but toppling tenements. 
The house (which has been demoHshed of late years), 
like not a few still standing, indicated the shifts people 
were put to, for room, in walled towns. Storey was piled 
on storey, till the lights that gleamed in the upper win- 
dows looked like stars. We owe pity rather than blame 
to the humble tenants of such lofty tenements. Tell 
them by all means, in the words of good Matthew Henry, 
that " cleanliness is nearly aUied to godliness ; " but for 
the sake of both, compel proprietors to supply water even 
to the topmost storeys. How can a house be clean, or 
the family tidy, where a mother has to descend five or 
six flights of stairs for every pail of water, and mount 
them again — perhaps with one child on her breast, and 
another at her apron-string? I think it true Christian 
work for preachers of God's Gospel to expose such 
wrongs — to preach, and teach, and enforce their reform. 
But another way of turning the limited space of walled 
cities to the best account, was to build the house in this 
wise — each storey projected further out than the one 
below it ; and, in some cases, from tenements that thus 
looked nodding to their fall, there rose the gabled front 
of an upper apartment which had no ceiling but the 
slates, nor access but a trap-stair. 

Such is the garret where lies the dying woman we go 
to visit. Picking every step along the foul close, and 
groping our way up flights of cork-screw stairs, we at 
length reach the topmost storey ; and, mounting by help 
of hands and feet a rickety ladder, find ourselves in a 
room that extends firom gable to gable — a curious as well 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. IJJ 



as cold place, with lines of posts stretching from end to 
end to prop up the crazy roof, and keep it from falling 
in. On our eyes getting accustomed to the feeble light, 
we look around, but see no furniture other than a stool, 
a box which serves the double purpose of cupboard and 
table, and a bed of straw spread out on the floor and 
covered with a bit of old carpet. There lies the woman, 
sinking into her grave ; a deserted wife, and mother of the 
little girl who watches by the dying bed, and who, but for 
God's mercy and woman's pity, would soon be cast an 
orphan, friendless and houseless, on a cold world. 

Far down below the waves, sunk among sludge and 
rusty anchors and mouldering skeletons, lie pearls, 
diamonds, gold, and other precious things which have 
perished in wrecks at sea ; and from time to time, those 
who seek to relieve the needy and raise the fallen, diving 
into the lowest depths of society, light on objects of 
greater value. Such an one was the tenant of this hovel. 
I have seldom, or never, seen a death-bed like hers. 
The glory of heaven came streaming down on it, as 
through an open door. I remember how a minister, 
when he described a visit of Robert M^Cheyne, told me, 
with tears rolling down his cheeks, that even for some 
days after that saintly man had left his house, it seemed 
a very holy place. I can understand tliat. Such seemed 
to me the cold, bare garret where this saintly woman lay 
a-dying — so triumphant was her victory over death ; so 
strong her faith ; so bright her hopes ; so calm her spirit ; 
her sense of God's holiness so hke that of the angels 
\¥ho, with veiled faces and feet, worship before the 

N 



1/8 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

throne ; her love of the Saviour so like what I fancy 
theirs to be who have seen Him, whom He has welcomed 
at the gates of glory. For such a death it were worth 
enduring her trials and closing life, as she did, on a pal- 
let of straw. 

It was through fire and water that she had been 
brought, notwithstanding her poverty, "into a wealthy 
place." Her father was a respectable manufacturer in 
the west of Scotland. After his death a brother's pro- 
fligacy made shipwreck of their fortunes ; reducing her 
and a sister, who both came to Edinburgh, to the neces- 
sity of earning their bread. On the death of her sister, 
who soon sank under the toil and late hours of needle- 
work, she manied a sawyer ; and he, dying after a short 
time, left her a widow with an infant daughter to support. 
Difficulties now beset her such as have driven some 
women to an infamous life. She sought to escape them 
by marrying an Irish labourer ; and " fleeing from a lion, 
a bear met her." Brutally used, and in the end deserted 
by him, she was reduced to terrible extremities. At this 
time, not unlike the mother whom the prophet found 
seeking a few sticks to dress her own and her son's last 
meal, this poor woman one day left her cabin on the 
edge of a wood to gather some fuel. She did not meet 
a prophet to fill the empty meal barrel ; but the prophet's 
Master. The sighs of the wind among the branches was 
the only answer returned to the sighs of her breaking 
heart. No voice in the wood startled her like that which 
called " Adam, Adam," amid the trees of Eden. Yet 
that wood was the place and that dark hour the time of 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 1 79 



her heavenly calling. Her misery was as much blessed 
to her, as the Prodigal's to him. Moved by a divine 
impulse, she threw herself down on the ground at the 
root of a tree, and, to use her own expression, " for the 
first time in her life prayed from her heart to God," — 
pouring out her sorrows before Him who is " a very pre- 
sent help in the time of trouble." On that day she 
entered on a new existence — in the words of Scripture 
''having nothing, yet possessing all things." There was 
no change, indeed, in her outward circumstances other 
than this, that, though God's waves and billows continued 
to break over her, she was not now drifting on a lee- 
shore, but riding the wild sea by an anchor storms never 
tore from its hold. As to her outward circumstances, 
these became worse rather than better ; for on returning 
to Edinburgh with a delicate and enfeebled frame, she 
found herself unable, on attempting it, to earn daily 
bread. She or her daughter must beg. It had come to 
that. A bitter alternative ; but she decided well, wisely, 
nobly. Sending her girl to school, she rose from her 
knees where she had sought strength to bear the cross, 
and bowing her head meekly to the will of God, went 
forth to ask for alms. May we learn from this, and espe- 
cially from what I go on to relate, to treat even beggars 
courteously — they may be saints ; though disguised, heirs 
of the kingdom. 

" O thou afflicted, tossed with tempest," happy was 
it for you, and for your child happier still, that before 
you had long travelled these hard streets on your weary 
rounds, you accosted one who did not need such counsel J 



l8o SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

This was a young lady who had left "the braes of 
Angus " for Edinburgh, and had a heavy enough burden 
of her own to carry. She at first declined the poor 
woman's appeal ; but did it so tenderly and courteously, 
that the other, painfully familiar with harsh and rough 
refusals, thanked her "for giving her a civil answer." 
Surprised and touched with this, she stopped ; and hav- 
ing inquired into the woman's circumstances, began to 
feel a deep interest in her. This issued in blessed 
results. She visited her; helped her in many ways; 
smoothed her dying pillow : and, after seeing her take 
wing to glory, spread her own kind wing over the orphan 
who wept at the dead mother's side. She took the lone 
one from that garret to her own home, and became as a 
mother to her. And when deeds that have been sung 
by bards, and rewarded by public honours, are forgotten, 
this, done in the secresy of Christian modesty and on the 
humblest stage, shall be brought out to light and have 
an imperishable reward. Rewarded indeed already, this 
kind and excellent woman has never had to regret yield- 
ing to a generous impulse, doing both a brave and bene- 
volent action. Hers was the faith, and hers has been 
the experience, of a poor Irishman, within whose home 
in the Cowgate I found a bright, rosy, fair-haired boy — 
an adopted child. In answer to my inquiries, the mother 
of the family said — 

" Oh, you see, your Reverence, that its father and 
mother who lived in the next room, died of the /every 
leaving the poor thing all by itself in the world. So 
Pat, that's my man, says to me, ^ Mary, we've plenty o' 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. l8l 

childer of our own, but we'll take it in. We'll never 

miss the orphan's bread." 

Nor did the benefactors of this girl. She grew up to 
be a credit and a comfort to them. And when I look on 
her photograph which, sent from London where she 
resides, now lies on the table before me, and recognise 
in this picture of a respectable and well-conditioned 
woman the features of the poor lassie I had seen stand- 
ing so lone and sad in that wretched garret beside a 
dying mother, I feel a renewed assurance that the bless- 
ing of the Father of the fatherless, the God of the widow 
and orphan, will rest on those who pity and relieve the 
miseries of the poor. 

I would hold up this case for imitation. It presents a 
peculiarly wise example of what, with all due respect to 
them, is above doctrinal creeds, Churches, and denomi- 
national distinctions, namely, "pure and undefiled reli- 
gion before God and the Father" — a religion which, 
according to the Apostle, is " To visit the widows and 
fatherless in their affliction, and keep ourselves unspotted 
from the world." The young lady who acted so gene- 
rously was not then in affluent, or even, as people would 
say, in very easy circumstances. Knowing that, I ex- 
pressed some surprise, not at the kindness, but at the 
boldness of her generosity ; and learned by her reply, 
to esteem her as much for her wisdom as I loved her 
for her kindness. "When my sister and I," she said, 
" came here, it was to see an amount of misery which 
we felt, though inclined, altogether unable to relieve. To 
attempt helping many cases was to dissipate our limited 



I&t SKETCHES OF THE COW GATE. 

means ; and do real good to none. So we resolved to 
apply our charities within narrow bounds ; to fix on an 
individual case ; not relax our hold, to take up another 
of those that were ready to perish, till we had saved 
one." 

Wisely resolved ! Trying to meet the claims of many, 
people waste their means of doing good, and perma- 
nently benefit none. According to those who have 
studied his habits, the lion knows better how to run 
down his prey — selecting, it is said, one of the herd, nor 
desisting from pursuit of it to pounce on any that may 
chance to come between them. However it doubles, 
however it dashes through the flock where others seem to 
offer a fatter feast and easier prey, on its track he keeps : 
follows all its windings ; ever bounding at its heels till 
he has run it down, and with a roar and spring buries 
his teeth in its quivering flesh. As God teaches the lion 
to act in slaying, so does this lady teach us to act in 
saving. If, instead of abortive attempts to relieve every 
beggar, and meet all cases that turn up, we, and our 
families, becoming blind and deaf to other claims, would 
fix on one, two, or three cases, as we are able, our efl"orts 
would be much more satisfactory and successful. We 
might not appear so busy as a worthy doctor of divinity, 
who, becoming a member of the committee of every 
good scheme in Edinburgh, had hardly even seated him- 
self in one, when, pulling out his watch, he seized his 
umbrella, and was ofl", — saying, " I have another com- 
mittee to attend." We might not appear to be doing so 
much good, and yet would really do a great deal more. 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 183 

We Stand, as it were, on a shore which resounds with the 
cries of men and women perishing before our eyes. We 
can swim. God helping us, we rush into the boiling 
surf, and breasting the billows, strike out for the drown- 
ing. We reach them ; but it is not to hold up the sink- 
ing head of one, and then, turning aside, to do the same 
office to another — that were to prolong, not relieve their 
misery- All we cannot save ; not more than one, per- 
haps : and certainly but one at a time. So, selecting first 
a child, a woman — some one least able to continue the 
struggle — we fix our left hand in their flowing hair, and 
with the right buffet our way back to the shore ; nor relax 
our grasp, nor stay our strong, rapid strokes, till spectators, 
who prayed God to help us as they watched our head 
rising and sinking among the waves, raise a long, loud 
shout of joy, and receive from our hands the living prey, 
plucked from the jaws of death. Thus nobly did this 
young woman, and her sister. Between them, they bore" 
the orphan in their loving arms, and brought her safe 
to land. Had they attempted more, they would have 
accomplished less : and while we admire their spirit, let 
us think how few there are but may copy their example. 
Let us try it, and, in the words of Scripture, "Go and do 
likewise." 




SKETCHES OF THE COWGATB 

V. — THE CONVICT. 
PART I. 

T the head of the Cowgate stands the Grass- 
market, a place^ in point of size and shape, not 
unlike the Piazza di San Marco at Venice. 
Mean as its buildings would look beside those of the 
Place of St. Mark, and dull as are its skies compared to 
those blue heavens of sunny Italy, it presents objects 
which carry us away to still sunnier climes, and to the 
old days when, with an enthusiasm which we would wish 
to see shown in the cause of Missions, Europe rose as 
one man to wrest the birth-place and tomb of our Saviour 
out ot the hands of the Infidel. 

Flat-roofed houses, such as may be seen in the photo- 
graphs of Eastern cities, still stand there, memorials of 
the old Crusaders, who, regardless of the need of steep- 
pitched roofs to carry off the rains and snows of our 
northern climate, preserved in their buildings the memory 
of years passed in fighting the battles of the Holy Sepul- 
chre, on the plains of Esdraelon and in the streets of 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 18$ 

Jerusalem. The days of chivalry and romance are gone 
— in the words of the poet, 

" The knights are dust, 
Their swords are rust. 
Their souls are with the saints we trust" 

These roofs, where the knights may occasionally, after 
the fashion of the East, have spread their couch, and, as 
they gazed up into the heavens, fancied that they were ' 
still in the land which was trod by the Blessed Feet that 
were nailed to the Tree for us, are now turned to very 
utilitarian purposes. In a breezy summer day the newly- 
washed clothes of the poor tenants, the successors of the 
Templars and Knights of St. John, are flying and flutter- 
ing there in the wind. 

How they escaped the destruction decreed by the 
Scottish Reformers on all objects of idolatrous worship, 
it is not easy to say ; but the black iron crosses of these 
ancient Orders still stand sharp out against the sky above 
some of their houses. Serving only perhaps the purpose 
of armorial bearings, they may not have been objects of 
idolatrous worship or superstitious reverence. This would 
account for their preservation : for the idea, common in 
England and current also to some extent in Scotland, that 
Knox and his coadjutors defaced and even destroyed 
the old cathedrals, is a mistake, — one that betrays on 
the part of those who circulate and believe it a com- 
plete ignorance of history. Knox and his associates did 
indeed procure the destruction of the monasteries — the 
retreats of lazy and the strongholds of bigoted eccle- 
siastics ; acting on what is now generally admitted to be 



1 86 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

the statesman-like wisdom of his own pithy saying, " Pull 
down the rookery, and the rooks will leave it." So far 
from destroying, or countenancing the destruction of, any 
of the fine old churches or cathedrals, he procured an 
Act of Council, imposing a heavy punishment on any of, 
as he calls them, " the rascally multitude," who should 
destroy or deface anything but images, and other objects 
of Popish idolatry. It is due to the character of our 
great and good Reformers, who have been often igno- 
rantly and sometimes maliciously traduced, to state this 
fact, and that the destruction of the fine old ecclesiastical 
buildings lies in most instances at the door of the landed 
proprietors who allowed their tenants, and of the town 
councils who allowed the citizens, to make quarries of 
them. 

But this place, the Grassmarket, is more interesting to 
Scotchmen by its connection with the Covenanters than 
the Crusaders. Nor to Scotchmen only ; for who that, 
ivith us, holds it equally detestable to force Protestantism 
on a Popish, Episcopacy on a Presbyterian, Presbytery 
on an Episcopalian, or Christianity on a heathen country, 
will not admire men standing up for the rights of con- 
science — even of an unenlightened conscience? Reli- 
gion is a sacred realm, where we have no king but con- 
science, or rather God. Nor was Christ's crown ever 
well defended, or His authority permanently enforced, 
by any sword but His own. Well, it was here, where the 
place of execution is still marked by paving-stones 
arranged in the form of a cross, that many a good man 
laid down his life in the dark days of old. We have 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. l87 

often fancied that we saw that place one sea of heads, 
with every eye fixed on the tall black gallows from which, 
amidst a hushed and awful silence, rose the last psalm of 
a hero of the Covenant, come there to play the Man ; 
or that we heard those last sublime words of McKail, 
" Farewell, father and mother, friends and relations ; — 
farewell, the world and all delights j — farewell, sun, moon, 
and stars ; welcome, God and Father ; welcome, sweet 
Jesus Christ, the Mediator of the New Covenant; — 
welcome, blessed Spirit of Grace, and God of all conso- 
lation ; — welcome, glory ; — welcome, eternal life ; — and, 
welcome, death ! " 

Sunk into a low estate, the Grassmarket, with the 
exception of a few respectable tenements, is now given 
up to mean inns, tippling shops, and low lodging-houses. 
It was in one of the latter that, as minister of the parish, 
visiting every house, I first found myself in the scene of 
a murder. I had fallen among thieves before — though 
not to suffer the fate recorded in Bible story. That 
rencontre happened in the College Wynd, soon after I 
came to Edinburgh, and produced feelings sufficiently 
unpleasant to leave a very distinct impression on my 
mind. In connection with those efforts which the 
Churches are now making to evangelise the heathen 
masses of our towns it were well for visitors who may 
expect such rencontres to go, as our Lord sent out His 
disciples, two by two ; but, young and strong then, I had 
no fear. So,, on a door being opened, where I had 
knocked, by a ruffian-looking fellow, whose face was 
deeply pitted by small-pox, and furnished with but one 



l88 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

eye — that, however, black as coal, and piercing as a 
hawk's — though evidently unwelcome, I pushed the door 
open, announced myself as minister of the parish, and 
passed into the room. Two men sat by the fire — one 
had the seedy dress, the wasted form and down-looking, 
suspicious air of a gaol-bird ; the other was a broad- 
shouldered, powerfully-built man, with a bold, reckless 
stare, a bandage bound over a bloody brow, and a head 
of shaggy hair, covered with an enormous fur cap. 
Neither of them rose when I entered ; made any show of 
civility ; spoke a word in reply to my Good-morning ; 
but, like their neighbour who had opened the door, main- 
tained a dead and ominous silence. There was that both 
in the apartment and its tenants which made me see at 
a glance that I had got among the Philistines. But as 
nothing was to be gained by showing the white feather, 
and something might be made of them by a kind and 
Christian bearing, I seized the only unoccupied stool ; 
and sitting down, began, after opening up the way by 
some common remarks, to tell them my message and 
of my Master. Whether it was because my bodily 
appearance, unlike the Apostle Paul's, was not con- 
temptible, or that guilt is cowardly, — for, as the Bible 
says. " the wicked flee when no man pursueth ; " and 
"there were they in great fear where no fear was,"— 
or that they felt their need of saving mercy, or that, 
as many of these rooms are divided from each other 
only by thin partitions, a scuffle would have been 
easily heard by the neighbours and help perhaps 
obtained, I know not ; but after awhile we separated — 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 189 

in peace ; each party, I fancy, equally pleased to be rid 
of the other. 

It was there, in the College Wynd, I first came in con- 
tact with the criminal population ; but it was here, in the 
Grassmarket, that I first found myself in a room where 
murder had been committed, and not long after the 
event. The access to the house itself was by a foul 
close, and to the apartment that was the scene of the 
murder by an outside trap-stair, the ground story being a 
stable, visible from above through the gaping seams of 
the floor. It was a long, wretched, dimly-lighted room, 
containing some half-dozen beds. I found the mistress 
of the house sitting by the fire smoking a pipe, and with 
her other three women — coarse-looking dirty slatterns — 
one of them a negress, black as the back of the chimney. 
Though afterwards, on my telling her that I knew that 
some of them were present at the murder, and that I 
stood on the very floor where blood had been shed, the 
landlady admitted it, she at first pretended ignorance. 
Not only so, she waxed very s-ngry, and swore hard, 
looking like one more ready to use a knife than an argu- 
ment in a dispute. I spoke seriously to them about their 
souls j but, with the exception of one, on whose face I 
saw a sad expression stealing, and the tears starting to 
her eyes, the others remained unmoved, hard as the 
hearth-stone ; and I left them, feeling that women have 
special need to seek God's grace to make them and keep 
them good : for, as the finest wine makes the sourest 
vinegar, they, on betaking themselves to a life of sin, 
become viler and more loathsome even than men. By 



190 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

nature more emotional, their character for good or evil is 
intensified ; it being with them as with those lands where 
the soil, stimulated by the sun's tropical heat, grows the 
sweetest fruits, and also the rankest poisons. They are 
like the prophet's figs, " the good are very good, and the 
evil are very evil, so evil that they cannot be eaten." 

The murder I refer to was committed by a man on his 
v/ife — the result of drinking, one of its many bitter and 
accursed fruits. Delirium, as well as drink, had probably 
something to do with it ; for this man had a nephew 
hanged for the same crime in Edinburgh a few years ago ; 
and though he also acted more or less under the influ- 
ence of drink, pretty strong evidence was led to show 
that there was hereditary insanity in the family. These 
cases, and many others, present a salutary warning. I 
not only believe, but am sure, that every one who 
possesses good health is most likely to preserve it by 
abstaining from the use of all intoxicating stimulants, 
regarding and using them as drugs, which they are 
proved to be by this peculiarity, that they make well 
men ill, and ill men well. But whoever should be total 
abstainers, there can be no difference of opinion about 
this, that all those who are of a highly excitable and 
nervous temperament, especially such as have any con- 
stitutional tendency to insanity, should totally abstain. 
For them to use stimulants is to pour oil, not on water, 
but on fire. Theirs is a system that requires to be 
soothed rather than stimulated ; and what is true of all 
is especially true of them, they don't know what crimes 
they may commit under drink. It was the duty of my 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I9I 

late excellent friend and colleague, Mr. Sym, to visit this 
wretched murderer in the gaol, and attend him to the 
scaffold ; and I remember of him telling how surprised 
and shocked he was, on repairing to the condemned ceU 
at five o'clock in the morning of the day of execution, to 
find him eating a very hearty breakfast, and, to all appear- 
ance, enjoying it as much as if he was about to go, not 
to the gallows, but to his day's work. This might arise 
from the apathy which is often associated with menta! 
imbecility, or it might be an illustration of the words 
ot Scripture, "The wicked have no bands in their 
death." If the latter, it was an awful warning of the 
extent to which sin can sear the conscience. The man 
was executed; and though satisfied that public execu- 
tions have the effect of brutalising the crowds who 
attend them, and that private ones were better, I do 
not sympathise with those who would quite abolish 
the penalty of death. I read these words as a com- 
mandment, " Whoso sheddeth man's blood, by man shall 
his blood be shed." Still, so dreadful a penalty should 
certainly never be awarded by Christian judges where 
there is any proved deficiency of intellect, or in any 
clear case of hereditary insanity ; nor, indeed, executed 
on any but cold-blooded, deliberate murderers. In all 
cases, save the last, imprisonment for life, while more 
congenial to the spirit of the Gospel, would satisfy the 
public conscience and ensure the public safety. 

It was from the neighbourhood and the society ol 
such neighbours as I have described, that the convict 
came whose case suggested a title to this article. One 



192 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

evening I was told that a man who wished to see me was 
waiting in the dining-room. After some considerable 
delay I went there, and found a stranger standing in the 
room, whose dress and face expressed great poverty, and 
something more. On asking him what he wanted, he 
hummed and hawed and beat about the bush, and began 
what promised, or rather threatened, to be a long story. 
I told him to hold up his head like a man, come at once 
to the point, tell me what he wanted, and if it was right 
and reasonable and within my power, he would get help. 
At this time the whole country was in a ferment, fright, 
and fever about ticket-of-leave men. The newspapers 
were filled with terrible stories of their robberies and 
murders. No wonder, therefore, that I was astonished, 
and almost startled, when he blurted out, " I'm a ticket- 
of-leave." 

He had gone astray in the first instance through the 
temptations of a whisky-shop where he had been em- 
ployed as a servant. Learning to drink there, one day, 
when muddled, he had stolen some of his master's pro- 
perty, and, being convicted, was sentenced to so many 
years of transportation or imprisonment. In proof of 
his good behaviour he showed me a Bible which he had 
received from the governor of our prison, on the fly-leaf 
of which that gentleman had written a very favourable 
account of him ; and also a certificate to the same effect 
from some of the officials of Portland prison, in England. 
Since regaining liberty, before his sentence was fully 
expired, he had returned to the paths of honesty, and 
made a great struggle to earn his bread. But unaccus- 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 193 

tomed to the hard labour of the only work which he 
could procure, his strength had given way, and the poor 
wretch had left the hospital to which he had been carried 
but some weeks before he called on me. He was out o£ 
employment, and could get none. Before making an 
appeal to me he had pawned every article of his furniture, 
and every rag of clothing that he and his wife could 
spare ; and on the night he came to my house he had 
left her and his children in his own, without bread or bed, 
without either fire or light. And he wound up this sad 
story — which I found to be all true — by bursting into a 
flood of tears, and saying, " I don't want to be a thief. 
I wish to live an honest life ; but, sir, unless you help me, 
I'll be driven to desperation — to commit crime ! " 

A sad and dreadful case ! Here was a man in this 
humane and Christian land, apparently doomed to evil 
and denied a chance of doing well. The fly-leaf of the 
Bible, the certificate from Portland might possibly be of 
no more value than the paper they were written on, or 
any rogue's profession of penitence. But in the side- 
board by which he stood there lay a proof of his honesty 
and integrity not to be misunderstood or gainsaid. There 
all my silver lay ; the drawers which contained it stood 
unlocked ; and he stood all alone by them in that room 
for at least ten minutes — the glittering prize within reach 
of his hand. Unless that had been an honest hand, and 
he an honest man, I had been left still poorer than John 
Wesley, who might have been wealthy, but, living to 
deny himself for Christ, never had more plate than two 
nitvet spoons. 

o 



194 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

It is a dreadful thing to close the door against any 
man's or woman's reformation. Religion calls us to hold 
it open to the worst, even as God holds it open to us 
who can — knowing more ill of ourselves than we can 
know of others — and ought to say with Paul, " This is 
a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that 
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of 
whom I am chief." Oh that some old prophet would 
rise from his grave to expose the sin and denounce 
the folly of our country ! She spends enormous 
sums in punishing crime and trying to reform criminals 
during the term of their imprisonment, but takes no 
proper steps to give them a chance of doing well when 
they return to society. When they have left the prison, 
society casts them out of her bosom as a foul thing ; or 
rather, as if they were vipers — and not men, blood of our 
blood and bone of our bone — shakes them back into the 
fire. This, a policy so unwise, and so alien to the mer- 
ciful spirit of the Gospel, was strongly brought out by the 
difficulties the ticket-of-leave man had encountered before 
he clung to me to rescue him from drowning, and by all 
my efforts to keep his head above water proving failures 
in the end. 

A few days before his visit, I had returned from Man- 
chester, where I had seen, in John Wright, perhaps the 
most remarkable philanthropist of our day. Belonging 
to the working classes, he had been a time-man in one 
of the mills there. When the factory bell rang, and the 
day's work was over, and some of his fellows returned to 
the comfort of their homes, and others went to spend 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 19$ 

their evenings and waste their wages in spirit or beer- 
shops, John, moved by a Christ-like compassion, turned 
his steps to the prison, and passing from cell to cell 
spent his evenings in reading God's Word to the pri- 
soners, in praying with them, in instructing them, in 
holding out to the worst the hope of heaven in a better 
world, and of a redeemed character and honest life in this. 
Wherever he found a hopeful case, he grudged no labour 
and spared no pains to have a situation ready for the per- 
son on his leaving the gaol. Take, for example, the case 
of a man who had stolen the tools of his fellow-workmen. 
By God's blessing on John Wright's instructions, this 
prisoner had undergone a great change of heart. Some 
days before his time was out, Wright went to his former 
master to tell him how penitent the thief had become ; 
how anxious he was to live an honest life ; that in short 
there was every reason to believe that he had found sal- 
vation where the gaoler of Philippi found it — within the 
walls of a prison. He pleaded with his former employer 
to take the penitent back. The gentleman was himself 
not unwilling to give the man a trial, but he feared that 
his workmen might object to the company of a convicted 
thief; besides dreading that he might steal again, and 
thus expose the innocent to suspicion. Admitting the 
force of this, John asked the master if he would receive 
him back provided his workmen made no objections. 
He consented ; and John's next step (for he was re- 
solved to leave no stone unturned) was to hold a meet- 
ing with the workmen. They assembled. Up rose 
Wright, and with a face beaming with benevolence, 

o s 



196 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 



and a tongue to which love and piety lent persuasive 
oratory, he pleaded the cause of the poor convict ; he 
implored them to give him a chance ; though not rich 
himself in this world's goods, he undertook out of his 
own poverty to make good whatever his protege might 
steal. The result was worthy of the kind hearts though 
rough hands of English workmen. To their honour it 
has to be told that they also assented. He was received 
back; and Wright's faith and their kindness had their 
reward. By years of the strictest integrity and honest 
labour this convict thoroughly redeemed his character. 
A noble man is John Wright ; single-handed, pursuing 
such a course as I have described, he has saved as many 
as three or four hundred convicts, leading them back to 
the paths of virtue, and restoring them to the bosom of 
society. 

To return to our ticket-of-leave man. With a little 
help to tide over a day or two, I gave him a letter to 
one of our principal house-painters in Edinburgh, telling 
what Wright had done, and entreating him to give the 
bearer work, and so save at least one poor wretch from 
ruin. My friend acceded to the request, and the poor 
fellow did his work well and honestly, and gave his 
master satisfaction. He, resorting now to the house of 
God, began to fill his room with furniture, and to lose 
that peculiar expression which those acquire who have 
gone through the curriculum of crime. Sad to say, he 
became a wreck after all ; took to living by his wits j 
and, the last time I heard of him, was raising money by 
playing tricks on people's compassion — sometimes Ijdng 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 197 

on the roadside as one faint and famishing with want j 
at other times simulating the convulsions of an epileptic. 
Let him not be too harshly blamed ! Slackness of trade, 
not his misconduct, led to his losing employment under 
the master to whom I had recommended him. He did 
not sink without a struggle. He sought, and got one 
place after another. But his antecedents had become 
known. " Convict " clung to him like the poisoned 
robe to Hercules ; and, on that account refused em- 
ployment, or dismissed from it, he was in a sense 
doomed to his fate. Refused here, and dismissed 
there, the unhappy man at length yielded to despair, 
and gave up the struggle — dragging his wife and chil- 
dren down into the same perdition with himself. The 
way of transgressors is hard, says God's Word — and 
such cases are full of warning ; but such dealing with 
those that have fallen into crime is little in harmony 
with the mind of Him who said, "Go, and sin no 
more." 

How large the number of convicts of one class or 
another is, may be estimated from this most deplorable 
and dreadful fact, that the Rev. W. C. Osborne, the 
Chaplain of Bath Gaol, who devoted much attention for 
many years to the condition of juvenile delinquents, cal- 
culates that about 10,000 children are annually sent to 
prison. Now by far the largest number of these, con- 
sidering the circumstances in which they have been bom 
and reared, are more deserving of pity than of punishment 
Place them in such circumstances, and what better would 
our own children be than the thousands who, first ne- 



198 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

glected and then punished, fill our gaols, and are the 
disgrace of our Churches and the danger of our country] 
By Reformatory, but especially Ragged Schools, by a 
kinder, wiser, and more Christian method of dealing with 
our poor, by our Churches of all denominations putting 
forth greater efforts to evangelise the heathen masses of 
our towns, by Government considering it its duty to 
employ the officials and revenues of the State more in 
the way of preventing crime than punishing it, God and 
conscience call us to a grand Christian work ; to much 
greater efforts on behalf of the lapsed and lost. A wail, 
a loud and pitiful cry, to the same effect, has come from 
the prison itself It reached the House of Lords through 
the Earl of Harrowby, in one of the most remarkable 
petitions to which the Peers ever listened It ran 
thus : — 

"The petition of the undersigned prisoners in the 
County House of Correction, at Preston, in Lancaster, 
" Humbly Sheweth, 

" That your petitioners have had painful experience of 
the miseries, bodily and spiritual, produced by beer- 
houses, and are fully assured that those places consti- 
tute the greatest obstacles to the social, moral, and reli- 
gious progress of the labouring classes. ... By frequent- 
ing them, parents bring their families to disgrace and 
ruin, and children are familiarised with vice and crime. 
. . . Your petitioners have all been drawn into offences 
and crimes of which they might otherwise have remained 
innocent. We speak from our own direct and bitter 
knowledge, when we declare that beer-houses lead to 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. I99 

Sabbath-breaking, blasphemy, fraud, robbery, stabbings, 
manslaughters, and murders ! 

" Your petitioners, therefore, desiring that others may 
be saved from the fate which has overtaken them, hum- 
bly, but most earnestly, pray that your Lordships would 
be pleased to take such measures as will, on the one 
hand, lead to the entire suppression of the beer-house 
curse, and, on the other, promote whatever may hold 
out the prospect of wholesome and rational amusement 
for the working population of the kingdom." 

Signed by 247 male prisoners. 

" This petition," says the Rev. John Clay, Chaplain of 
the House of Correction at Preston, and a man as emi- 
nent for his integrity as for his labours and philanthropy, 
** was drawn up after I had carefully read upwards of 
eighty written statements, by as many different prisoners, 
and was, as far as I could make it so, a digest of those 
statements. ... As to the signatures themselves, I be- 
lieve none were ever more heartily attached to a petition 
than these." We had a singular echo of this earnest and 
strange cry a short time ago from the lips of a prisoner 
in the High Court of Justiciary. After sentence had 
been pronounced, and as the policemen were removing 
him from the bar, the condemned man turned round, and 
facing the bench where the judges sat in their robes of 
office, he fixed his eyes on them, and in a voice that rang 
over all the Court exclaimed, " It were better for you 
to close the whisky-shops than punish the crimes they 
lead to.^'' 

Better days are dawning over tne heads of those who 



200 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATK. 

in so many instances have been more sinned against than 
sinning. But our space is exhausted, and leaving what 
we have to say further on the subject to another article, 
in the meantime we commend to the interest, sympathy, 
and prayers of Christian men and women, " such as sit 
in darkness and in the shadow of death, being bound in 
affliction and iron." Let us not doubt that, if we are 
diligent in working, and noble in sacrificing, and urgent 
in praying, He who is very pitiful and of great mercy 
will in respect of them, as of us, in a sense convicts as 
well as they, make good these words : — 

Such as sit in darkness and in the shadow of death, being bound in 

affliction and iron ; 
Because they rebelled against the words of God, and contemned the 

counsel of the Most High : 
Therefore He brought down their heart with labour ; they fell down, 

and there was none to help. 
Then they cried unto the Lord in their trouble, and He saved them 

out of their distresses. 
He brought them out of darkness and the shadow of death, and 

brake their bands in sunder. 
Oh that men would praise the Lord for His goodness, and for His 

wonderful works to the children of men ! 
For He hath broken the gates of brass, and cut the bars of iron 

insundec 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 



V. — THE CONVICT. 

PART II, 
ti 






liiitAa.' 



^T^ MAN overboard ! a man overboard ! ** — such 
was the cry that, a few days ago, in the 
Channel, rose and ran along our deck in 
rapid, eager, earnest tones. — A man overboard ! — I had 
often seen the words in print, as sitting by the quiet fire- 
side on a winter evening, I read stories of the sea, and 
of hair-breadth escapes by flood and field. But it is 
another thing to hear that dreadful sound; to feel it 
strike the heart like a knife ; and to pass — for it came 
more suddenly on us than a clap of thunder — in one 
moment from a dreamy calm into a state of intense 
and almost agonising anxiety. 

We had reached mid-channel between the coasts of 
France and England, and, over one of the smoothest seas 
keel ever ploughed, were making rapid way for the white 
cliffs of Dover, which rose at every turn of the paddle- 
wheels higher and more visible over our bows. Above, 
the sun was riding in a sky almost as blue and bright as 



202 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

we had left in Italy : the sea lay around like a sheet of 
glass j there was not a breath of wind to stir a leaf, or dis- 
turb the long, black train of smoke which we left hang- 
ing quietly over our foaming wake. Nature had drawn 
off her fierce and fiery elements to thunder in a storm 
which was at that hour breaking on Paris — leaving to us 
a sky without a cloud, an ocean without a wave, and a 
calm which, soothing some to sleep, and charming others 
into day-dreams and quiet contemplation, was broken by 
no sound but the quick and steady beat of our paddles. 
Looking back with grateful hearts to the Providence 
which had preserved us during a tour of some months un- 
harmed, as well when we stood on the edge of the fiery 
volcano, as when we rode giddy paths along the face of 
mountains that plunged down into frightful gorges and 
rose overhead in precipices crowned with eternal snoWs, 
and looking forward with happy hearts to the pleasant 
prospect of casting anchor in our home, my fellow- 
traveller and I were seated on deck, enjoying the quiet 
scene and the shade of one of the ship's boats which 
hung in her slings at our back. 

All of a sudden the cry rose, " A man overboard ! " 
turning this scene into a whirlwind of wild excitement. 
Men threw themselves on the boat which had lent us its 
grateful shade. It was now to do better service. In less 
time than I take to tell, it was loosed — was dropped — 
the rope as it flew through the mate's hands taking the 
skin with it ; was afloat ; and five of the crew tumbling 
into it, they were off— bending their backs to the strain, 
and their oars to the breaking. As the alarm broke on 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 203 

the calm air, and rang from stem to stem, passengers 
came crowding up from the cabin ; and, the strong 
elbowing the weak out of the way without regard either 
to rank, or sex, or age, from all quarters a rush was made 
to the poop, which we soon gained to descry, terrible to 
see, the form of a man stretched out at full length on the 
water, and floating already a long way off in the white 
wake of our steamer. It was wonderful to see how the 
crew, amid the cries and wild confusion of the scene, dis- 
played the characteristic promptitude and admirable 
coolness of seamen. There was neither man nor oar to 
seek, when they were wanted. Not an instant of time 
was lost ; nor was there any to lose, as the boat, springing 
forward like a horse, went off to the rescue, followed by 
our eyes and our prayers. Though the steam had been 
instantly shut off, our impetus had carried us far ahead of 
the drowning man. Still I could see how matters went 
with him, and that he lay like a log on the water ; gently 
rising and falling in the swell of our wake, but moving 
neither hand nor foot. Concluding that he had known 
the right thing to do in such jeopardy, and had possessed 
sufficient presence of mind, so soon as he rose to the 
surface, to throw himself on his back — and that, as the 
human body, though specifically heavier than fresh, is 
lighter than salt water — he had thus a good chance of 
floating till help arrived, I ventured, to the great comfort 
of some women who stood beside me, pale and trembhng, 
to exclaim, " He is safe ! " 

But that floating form, on which all eyes were fixed, 
by-and-by grew visibly less. It did not show in the 



•04 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 



water as it had done at first. The man was sinking — 

that was plain. The reason this, that his clothes, parting 
with the air that buoyed them up, were getting water- 
logged : and at this time, the boat, foreshortened, in the 
same line of vision with him, and now a long way astern, 
seemed but creeping along the sea. We got terribly im- 
patient. Some, indeed, stood dumb, rooted to the spot ; 
but the feelings of others broke out into cries — of dis- 
satisfaction, Why is not the boat better manned ? Why 
don't they pull ? — or of despair, Oh, they'll never reach 
him ! He sinks ! He's gone ! — or, like ours, of hope. 
He's on his back, and floats ! They are getting up to 
him ! See, they ship their oars ! Now they have him ; 
he is saved ! So it fell out. And offering silent thanks 
to Him without whom a sparrow falls not to the ground, 
we saw strong arms stretched over the gunwale; and, 
seizing it by the head and shoulders, haul the body into 
the boat. Animated by the spirit of those kind angels 
who, as they watch the events of earth from heaven, 
rejoice over every sinner that repenteth, break forth 
into anthems and songs of praise over every soul 
which Jesus plucks from perdition, many on board, 
when they saw the drowning man in the boat, broke 
out into a cheer. It floated away over the waters, 
grateful to the ears of the gallant men who had flown 
to the rescue, and pulled with a will. God was thanked. 
The sailors hastened back with the body ; and as soon 
as, after a period of suspended animation on its part, 
and painful suspension on ours, word passed up from 
the cabin where it had been carried that life had 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 205 

returned, universal joy diffused itself through all the 
ship. 

A man overboard ! the cry, which seems still to ring in 
Dur ears, describes in brief and graphic terms the con- 
dition of the Comdct. But how marked the contrast be- 
tween the apathy of many to his fate, and the anxiety of 
all on board our steamer to see the drowning plucked 
from the jaws of death ! Alas for human nature ! — 
thousands will rush to save a man from drowning in the 
sea who would not move a foot, or finger, to save him 
from perishing in his sins. Yet what is a life lost to a 
soul lost ? The struggles of the first death are soon over. 
Let yonder wretch alone ; raise no alarm ; man no boat ; 
piy no oar ; and it is but a few more gasps, " a bubbling 
cry," and his head goes down ; and ere his last breath 
rises in the air-bells which break on the surface of a sea 
that has already resumed its placid aspect, the man is 
dead, and his body is slowly sinking into the quiet 
depths of its watery grave. If he was a man of God, it 
is well. Ransomed by the blood of Christ, his happy 
spirit has gone where his sun shall no more go down, nor 
his moon withdraw her light ; and the days of his mourn- 
ing are ended. But his is a fate inexpressibly and in- 
finitely wretched who falls into crime ; who is lost to 
" whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are 
honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are 
pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are 
of good report : " whose misspent life oscillates between 
the barred solitude of a prison and the riot of brutal de- 
baucheries; whose past is full of the bitterest regrets, 



ao6 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATK. 

and whose future, wrapped in gloom, is not lighted but 
by the lurid gleams of " the fire that is never quenched." 

To this cruel fate the convict was long doomed. The 
great mass of society took no interest in him. What was 
to them the cry, A man overboard ! — ^with sumptuous 
feasts below, and music and dances on the deck, they left 
the wretch to sink, and perish. Some indeed had com- 
passion on him. But the inhumanity and apathy of the 
public offered no greater contrast to the spectacle on 
board our steamer, to the anxiety and rush of all to save 
the man " overboard," than did the folly of such plans as 
were employed to reform convicts, to the wise and 
prompt steps the sailors took to pluck the drowning 
from a watery grave. 

As I said in closing the first part of this article, a 
better day, thank God, has dawned, and now shines on 
the heads of those who, convicts and criminals as they 
are. have, in many instances, been fully as much sinned 
against as sinning. For the lapsed and dangerous 
classes. Reformatory, and especially Ragged, Schools are 
doing a great work. These destroy crime in the bud ; 
they cut off the springs that have long poured a 
flood of crime and misery over the land. Our experi- 
ence in Edinburgh speaks volumes in their favour ; and 
the statistics of other places are not less remarkable. As 
the rooms of the ragged schools filled, the cells of the 
prison emptied. Our increase was their decrease. As 
the stream which flowed into the gaol grew less and less, 
it was plain to everybody that we had tapped one of the 
principal sources of crime ; and were draining it awaj. 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. IC/ 

Let me illustrate this by the reports of Mr. Smith, the 
excellent governor of our gaol. Our Ragged, which are 
also feeding and Industrial Schools, were opened im the 
summer of 1847, and the number of children under four- 
teen years of age in prison when we began 

In 1847 was ..•••• 5 per cent 
In 1848 it fell to • • • • • 3 i» t» 
In 1849 ,, •••••«„„ 
In 1850 „ • • • ••!„,, 
Ini^si , 4 ,. „ 

— in other words, when we began our work, out of every 
hundred prisoners there were five under fourteen years of 
age. Year by year the number decreased ; until four or 
five years afterwards there was but one prisoner under 
fourteen years of age in every two hundred. Thus by 
means of Ragged Schools, in the course of four years 
Edinburgh reduced the commitments of juveniles to a 
tenth part of what they were before the schools were 
opened. In fact we did, and are doing, by Christian 
care and kindness, what the costly, not to say cruel, ap- 
paratus of police and prisons, banishment and the gal- 
lows, had utterly failed to accomplish. Our experiment 
has proved a triumph — a great, blessed, and unques- 
tionable success. And what is now the duty of Chris- 
tians, but, taking pity on those who are ready to perish, 
to support to the utmost of their power schemes that are 
based on the principles, conducted in the spirit, and im- 
bued with the very genius of the Gospel ! Happy the 
man who thus saves one poor, wretched, neglected 
child; who is able, though in a subordinate sense, to 



2o8 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATB. 

adopt these lofty words, and say, " None eye pitied thee, 
to have compassion upon thee ; but thou wast cast out in 
the open field, to the loathing of thy person, in the day 
that thou wast bom. And when I passed by thee, and 
saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee 
when thou wast in thy blood. Live." 

Prevention is better than cure. Still, though the 
churches and the country should chiefly trust, under 
God, to the influence of preventive measures, we are not 
to despise, or despair of, those of a reformatory kind. 
Miss Mary Carpenter, a lady no less eminent as a philan- 
thropist than her brother, Dr. Carpenter, of London, is as 
a physiologist, has proved this in a book which she has 
lately published. It forms two volumes, under the title 
of " Our Convicts ; " and is deeply interesting. For- 
merly, two grand plans had been tried with the view of 
reforming convicts ; and both had proved grand failures. 
The one was called the Solitary, the other the Silent 
system. Under the first, the prisoner was immured 
within the four walls of a cell during the whole teim of 
his sentence ; and there, with the exception of an official, 
no human creature was permitted to enter. Within the 
throbbing heart of a great city he was more lonely than 
an anchorite ; he neither saw a human face, nor heard 
the sound of a human voice — for long months or years 
a dreary narrow cell being all the world to him. This 
system of burying a man alive was to work wonders. 
Well, it was tried on an extensive scale in America ; and 
the result was, that many of the poor wretches sank into 
a state of idiotcy, or became raving maniacs. It could 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 209 

not be otherwise. No scheme for making bad men 
good, or good men better, can succeed, which, Uke 
this, traverses human nature, and sets at nought the 
laws of Him who made men, not solitary, but social 
beings. 

The second, which is called the Silent system, I saw 
in full operation in a vast prison in London. After many 
strong doors had been opened, and locked behind us, we 
were ushered into a large hall, and the company of four 
or five hundred convicts. A sadder sight it was never 
my fortune to see. They were all attired in the same 
garb, and engaged in the same employment — teasing 
oakum. Raised in a sort of pulpit, before each section, 
for they were divided into sections, sat a guardian, whose 
sole business was to keep his eyes fixed on the quota of 
men under his charge, and see that none either spoke, or 
even communicated by signs with each other. It was a 
strange and unearthly spectacle to see this vast crowd 
working on in dumb show, — apparently so subdued and 
crushed in spirit that, though the sound of our feet and 
our suppressed whispers broke the death-like silence, no 
head was lifted, nor face turned up to look on us. 
There no man might breathe a word or make a sign 
to his next neighbour. Alone in a crowd, each was 
doomed to sit during all the hours of the day, and all 
the days of the week, and all the weeks of the month, 
and aU the months of the year. Anything more mon- 
strous, outraging more the laws of God, the feelings of 
man, and the dictates of common sense, it is not pos- 
rible to fancy. 



2IO SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

In visiting other rooms within these gloomy walls we 
found large bands of tailors and shoemakers and other 
artisans, all convicts, plying their several trades; each 
with a heart bursting to hold communion with his fel- 
lows. At length we got ensconced in the office of one of 
the master tradesmen, and, mounting a stool, sat down 
to examine him. He laughed the whole thing to scorn. 
As a plan of reforming criminals he pronounced it to be 
an utter failure, regarding it with the same contempt as 
the head officer of the Bow Street police expressed for 
punishment — his answer to my question, what he thought 
of it as a means of reformation, being to snap his fingers 
and say, " I don't give that for it." 

In those very interesting volumes to which I have re- 
ferred, Miss Carpenter enters into the details of a new, 
humane, Christian, and common-sense system of dealing 
with convicts. Established in Ireland by Captain 
Crofton, it has yielded results so happy, and almost in- 
credible, as to remind us of the beautiful imagery of 
Scripture, "the desert shall blossom as the rose." Our 
space will not permit us to enter into its interesting 
details. Suffice it to say that it meets the peculiar cir- 
cumstances of the convict, both during his imprisonment 
and after it ; that it is based on the constitution of human 
nature and the laws of Providence, and is in all respects 
conformable to the principles and benignant spijit of our 
holy faith. As to its success, Mr. Hill, a very high 
authority in such matters, says, " In my humble judg 
ment, the Board of Directors of Irish Convict Prisons 
have practically solved the problem which has so long 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 811 

perplexed our Government and our Legislature — What 
shall we do with our Convicts ? The results of their 
great experiment answer thus : — Keep your prisoners 

UNDER SOUND AND ENLIGHTENED DISCIPLINE UNTIL 
THEY ARE REFORMED — KEEP THEM FOR YOUR OWN 
SAKE AND FOR THEIRS. ThE VAST MAJORITY OF ALL 
WHO ENTER YOUR PRISONS AS CRIMINALS CAN BE SENT 
BACK INTO THE WORLD, AFTER NO UNREASONABLE TERM 
OF PROBATION, HONEST MEN AND USEFUL CITIZENS. 
Let THE SMALL MINORITY REMAIN, AND IF DEATH 
ARRIVE BEFORE REFORMATION, LET THEM REMAIN FOR 
LIFE." 

Captain Crofton gives the result of his experience in 
these hopeful words, " I should hesitate to pronounce , 
any convict incorrigible." And Captain Maconochie, 
who, as governor of Norfolk Island, had to deal with the 
worst criminals our country ever flung out of its lap, 
bears similar testimony, in still stronger terms. In a 
pamphlet which he published on " Norfolk Island " in 
1848, he says, " I found the island a turbulent, brutal 
hell, and I left it a peaceful, well-ordered community. 
My system desires to gain soul as well as body, — to in- 
fluence, and not merely coerce. It draws the line of 
duty under the guidance of religion and morality : not of 
conventional regulation. It seeks to punish criminals by 
placing them in a position of severe adversity, from 
which only long-sustained effort and self-denial can ex- 
tricate them; but it does not desire to aggravate this 
position by unworthy scorn, or hatred, or contempt ; and, 
on the contrary, it respects our common nature, however 



2ia SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

temporarily fallen or alienated. I was working with nature, 
and not against her, as all other prison systems Jo." 
" My experience," he states, in evidence given before the 
Select Committee of 1856, "leads me to say that there is 
no man utterly incorrigible. Treat him as a man, and not 
as a dog. You cannot recover a man except by doing 
justice to the manly qualities which he may have about 
him, and giving him an interest in developing them." 
Brave, wise, hopeful, devout. Captain Maconochie seemed 
to have taken for his motto these grand words, "All 
things are possible to him that believe th." He had faith 
in the grace of God and in the laws of nature j and under 
his hands Norfolk Island, appropriated to the worst con- 
victs, and once *' a turbulent, brutal hell," presented one 
of the finest illustrations of the poet's words : — 

•• Faith, bold faith, the promise seea^ 
And trusts to that alone ; 
Laughs at impossibilities, 
And says, It shall be done.** 

I can fancy nothing better calculated to encourage my 
readers to pray, labour, and hope for the lost, than one 
case which Captain Maconochie relates, and with a brief 
account of which I close this article. 

Charles Anderson, the son of a sailor who was 
drowned, being left an orphan at his mother's death, was 
reared in a workhouse. After serving his apprenticeship 
in a collier, he joined a man-of-war; and, being 
severely wounded in the head at the battle of Navarino, 
was ever afterwards liable to be thrown into violent 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 213 

fits of excitement by drink or irritation. Getting drunk 
in a seaport in Devonshire, Anderson engaged in a street 
disturbance with some other sailors ; and some shops 
having been broken into on the occasion, he, though 
quite unconscious of any participation in the crime, was 
tried, and sentenced to seven years' transportation. He 
was sent, as a convict, to New South Wales. Believing 
himself unjustly punished, a bitter hostility against man- 
kind took possession of him. Mentally and morally 
ignorant, he had no idea of patient submission; but, 
though his floggings were innumerable, punishment had 
no effect on him. Harshness could neither bend nor 
break his spirit ; and kindness was never dreamt of Sent 
to Goat Island (an insulated rock in Sydney harbour), 
the poor fellow was sentenced for some offence to wear 
irons for a whole twelvemonth — a period which he com- 
pleted, but not till his back had been gashed by twelve 
hundred lashes. At length, for new offences, some very 
trivial — such as looking round from his work, and some 
very natural — such as attempting to escape, he was 
sentenced, after receiving in all three hundred lashes, to 
be chained to a rock for two years. To it the wretched 
man was fastened by his waist with a chain twenty-six 
feet long : with irons on his legs, and barely a rag to 
cover him. His only bed was a hollow scooped out in the 
rock; and he had no other shelter than a wooden lid 
perforated with holes, which was locked at night and 
removed in the morning. Had he been, not a man, but 
a wild beast, he could not have been worse treated ; the 
vessel containing his food was pushed towards him by 



214 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

means of a pole ; and though people who passed in boats 
occasionally threw him pieces of bread or biscuit, no per- 
son was permitted to approach or speak to him. With- 
out clothing on his back or shoulders, which were raw 
with the sores of repeated floggings, maggots, rapidly 
engendered in a hot climate, fed upon his flesh ; and, 
denied water to bathe his wounds, when rain fell he 
would lie and roll in it in his agony. At length Ander- 
son was sent to Norfolk Island to work in chains for life. 
On his arrival. Captain Maconochie found him there 
with the worst of characters for insolence, for violence, 
and insubordination; looking, though only twenty-four, 
as if he were forty years old. With boundless faith in 
the power of wise, firm, but kind and Christian treat- 
ment. Captain Maconochie set himself to reclaim this 
wretched and wicked creature. I cannot dwell on the 
details ; but step by step the poor fellow rose from the 
condition of a beast to the heart and bearing of a man. 
Being at length put in charge of a signal station on 
Mount Pitt, the highest point on the island, Anderson's 
delight was extreme. He, who had been chained like 
some wild monster to a lonely sea-rock, felt himself 
a man again; and, dressed in sailor costume, he soon 
regained the bearing of a man-of-war's man. A desperado 
once, now tamed, subdued, "clothed and in his right 
mind," he was to be seen cultivating flowers in his patch 
of garden, where the best potatoes on the island were 
grown, and whence many a freshly-dug basketful was, in 
token of gratitude, carried to Captain Maconochie's 
house. " What smart httle fellow may that be 1 " asked 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 21$ 

Sir George Gipps, pointing, as they drove through the 
beautiful scenery, to a man who was tripping along in 
trim sailor dress, full of importance, with a telescope 
under his arm. " Who do you suppose ? " replied the 
Captain ; " that is the man who was chained to the rock 
in Sydney Harbour." " Bless my soul, you do not mean 
to say so ! " was the astonished rejoinder. It was 
Anderson. 

One can fancy they hear God saying, as He bends 
over him, " This my son was dead, and is alive again ; 
he was lost, and is found ; " and adding, as He points us 
to this noble triumph of wisdom and Christian kindness 
— to the wanderer brought home, the lost one saved — 
" Go thou and do likewise." The soul of the lowest 
criminal is as precious and immortal as our own. It 
was bought at the same price, and redeemed on the same 
Cross; and as God instructed the Israelites to be kind 
to strangers because they themselves had been strangers 
in the land of Egypt, besides humbling our pride, it 
should awaken our sympathy on behalf of " convicts," to 
reflect that we all are convicts by the law, and in the 
sight of God. " Judgment " — I quote the words of in- 
spiration — " has come on all men to condemnation," — 
" death has passed on all men, for that all have sinned." 
The long-suffering and mercy we ask God to extend to 
us, it surely becomes us to show to others. Only to 
hang, banish, and imprison convicts, ill becomes those 
who have sinned more against God's laws and love than 
the worst convicts have sinned against theirs. The best 
of us are monuments of long-suffering mercy ; and other 



2l6 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

grounds of hope have none but these : " Who shall lay 
anything to the charge of God's elect ? It is God that 
justifieth : who is he that condemneth ? It is Christ 
that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at 
the right hand of Gk>d, who also maketh intercession 
for us." 




SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

VI. EVANGELISTIC EFFORTS. 

SHORT while after I had published my " Plea 
for Ragged Schools ; " or, " The City, its Sins 
and Sorrows," a person with the appearance 
and manners of a lady was introduced into my study. I 
could not recollect having seen her before, or even heard 
the name which the servant, who ushered her in, an- 
nounced. When we have many visitors, one knocks the 
other out of mind, like the tow balls of the boys' wooden 
guns. So motioning her to a chair, I began with the 
usual apology, in case I had forgotten her, and added, 
plunging at once in medias res, " May I request to know 
your business ? " 

" You don't know me, sir ; but I have read your 
book. I also take an interest in the condition of the 
poor." 

Flattering myself that she had come as a volunteer, to 
offer the aid of her personal services, or out of the folds 
of her silken robes to draw a long purse wherewith to oil 
the wheels of our machinery, I laid do\m my pen, and 



8l8 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

with it some feeling of chagrin at being interrupted in 
my work, saying-, 

" I am delighted to hear it, and glad to find any who 
do ; for, like the Jews of old, the great mass * drink wine 
in bowls, and dance to the sound of the tabret and viol, 
and are not grieved for the afflictions of Joseph.' " 

" Well," she said, " I have come to ask you a ques- 
tion." 

Was that all? My expectations dropped h*ke the 
mercury before a storm ; and I began again to finger my 
pen, dreading a waste of time ; for, on taking a sharper 
look at my visitor, I thought she looked rather senseless, 
forward and fantastic too. However, I professed myself 
ready to answer her question to the best of my ability. 

Whereupon, smoothing down her dress, she drew her- 
self up, and looked into my face with a queer expression 
in her own — a sort of simpering, incredulous smile. I 
wondered what was coming ; and when it came, was, for 
a moment, taken as much aback as I ever was in my 
life. 

"You don't mean to say," she said, "that those stories 
you have put into your book, about the poor, their vices 
and their misery, are true, do you ? " 

The idea of a lady coming into a minister's study, and, 
looking him full in the face to say in effect, Now confess 
that you have been throwing dust in the eyes of the 
public, and playing on their credulity, was so ludicrous 
that it was impossible to be angry. Such barefaced im- 
pertinence rather amused me than otherwise ; and I 
could only preserve my gravity by thinking of the gross 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 219 

ignorance it betrayed of something more important than 
rules of politeness, and of- the sad consequences such 
ignorance in those who could give help entails on those 
who need it. This was a serious and sickening thought. 
So instead of answering " a fool according to her folly," 
by laughing at her impudence, or walking her to the 
door, I advised my visitor to spend a forenoon visiting 
some of the Closes of the Cowgate ; telling her what I 
tell my readers, that no statement I have ever made, or 
ever read as made by others, no picture painted with the 
most graphic touches and strongest colours, conveys any 
adequate idea of the deplorable, degraded, and desperate 
condition of thousands who perish at our very doors, — in 
the Cowgates, St. Giles's, and Gallowgates of our large 
towns. 

Instead of entering into details — always painful and 
often disgusting — descriptive of their abject poverty, 
their appalling wretchedness, their gross ignorance, 
their immoral and irreligious habits, we shall be better 
employed in tracing these to their causes. Let us get 
at the root of the evil, and there is hope of stopping it — 
a few well-directed blows of the knife there being better 
bestowed than any hewing or hacking of the branches. 
Tracing these evils to their source, and describing also 
the remedial agencies by which they may be met, and 
have been so in instances not a few with triumphant 
success, I may hope that a goodly number of my readers 
t\dll engage in the work ; saving others from ruin and 
themselves from the curse — " Curse ye Meroz, curse ye 
bitterly the inhabitants thereof, because they came not 



220 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

■■■ ■ -■■ I ■■■■ ■■ III - -.■-■ — ■ ■■«.■> . « ■ .I. --■-.■ I. I I l . | ■!■ t *« 

to the help of the Lord, to the help of the Lord against 

the mighty." 

It is not to one but many sources we are to attribute 
the sins and sorrows of our cities, and the ungodly, de- 
graded condition into which many of their inhabitants 
have sunk. 

One of these lies in the entire separation of the higher and 
lower, the wealthier and poorer classes. 

As if the different orders were mutually repellant, the 
upper classes now-a-days reside in one district; the 
middle in another ; our tradesmen and artisans in a 
third ; our common labourers in a fourth ; while the 
lowest and lapsed classes have their own quarters, where 
they are crowded together to rot the faster, like heaps of 
manure. How different, and much more favourable to 
the general good, the state of matters in Edinburgh and 
our other large towns a century ago ! One roof covered 
people of many ranks. Peer, lawyer, divine, merchant, 
mechanic, labourer, all entered by the same door; one 
stair leading to different storeys, being common to their 
families ; one close mouth at least opening on their dif- 
ferent houses. Daily meeting, they were familiar with 
each other's faces ; and came to know more or less of 
each other's history ; and take an interest in each other's 
welfare. Their circumstances were such that the good 
acted as a restraint on the bad ; and while the devout 
and decent, like salt, checked the progress of corruption, 
they produced by their presence such an assimilating 
effect on the mass around them as did the leaven which 
the woman hid in the three measures of meal. 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATK. ttl 

This happy mingling together of different classes is 
still common in many continental cities. In Rome for 
example, where we resided in the Via Babuino, — the 
favourite quarter of the English, — we had a dairy and a 
barber's shop opposite our lodgings ; a baker sold bread 
on one side of the door, and on the other the shops of 
one or two picture-dealers separated us from the palazzo 
of an Italian prince, at whose gate might be seen at any 
time the gorgeous equipages of Roman nobles, and the 
coaches of cardinals, distinguished by the large red 
umbrella, the insignium of their office, that lay a-top 
the carriage. In Naples, our house in the Riviera di 
Chiaia brought us into still closer proximity with high 
life. One roof covered us and a ducal family — the noble 
occupying the two upper stories of the house, and we the 
one below him and above the shops. 

" Be ye courteous," says the Apostle ; and the cour- 
teousness which, exalted by him into a Christian duty, 
characterises those nations of the Continent that, though 
our inferiors in morals and religion, are so much superior 
to us in polish and politeness, is one good effect pro- 
duced by the mingling together of the different classes 
of society. But that is calculated to produce still more 
important results. To illustrate this, let me take a house 
in Paris, as I knew it nearly forty years ago. The two 
lower stories were occupied by a family belonging to the 
French noblesse^ while the tenant of the third was a 
banker, at whose house I was in the habit of visiting. 
The apartment of the upper floor, right above my friend's 
saloHs was occupied by a cobbler, the sound of vrhosfs 



aaa sketches of the cowgatk. 

busy hammer, though dulled, was distinctly audible 
below. Now suppose that the cobbler, who probably 
lived, like most of his craft, from hand to mouth, had 
been seized with fever. The silent hammer would have 
proclaimed the misfortune, awakening attention and lead- 
ing to inquiry ; and the result had been that my friend, 
the banker, would have taken an interest in the case of 
his honest but suffering neighbour, and found some way 
or other of supplying the wants of the family till the 
head of it had been able to resume work. But let a 
similar case happen in the Cowgate, or any such locality; 
and see the result ! John Thomson, a sober, decent, in- 
dustrious shoemaker, who, like a wise and virtuous man, 
has married in early life, is struck down by fever. He 
can do nothing now to maintain his wife and children. 
And what can his neighbours do for him ? — all being as 
poor, and some indeed poorer than himself. None, it is 
true, are so kind to the poor as the poor ; making sacri- 
fices for each other which put to shame those who look 
down on them. How often have I known instances of 
their watching, after a hard day's work, through the live- 
long night by the bed of a suffering neighbour ? People 
whose charity never seriously interferes with their daily 
comforts, think they do well when doling out a shilling, 
half-a-crown, or the double of it, to help a distressed 
tamily. But God's balances weigh differently from ours ; 
and the humble washerwoman, for instance, who gives 
nothing save a night's watching, but, giving that, unfits 
herself for the next day's work and forfeits its wages, is, 
m relation to her means and circumstances, a more mag- 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 323 

nificent donor. So far, however, as money is concerned, 
Thomson's neighbours are able to give Uttle or no help. 
They have enough to do to keep their own heads above 
water ; and in these circumstances, the pawn-shop, where 
money can be borrowed on clothes and articles of fiuni- 
ture, offers the readiest way of filling hungry mouths — 
feeding the children who cry for bread, and the mother 
who has none to give them. So long as the cobbler lies 
on a sick bed, his Sunday dress can be dispensed with. 
So it goes first to pawn ; and for some days the money 
borrowed on it keeps the wolf from the door. The small 
library of the poor man goes next — all except his Bible, 
an article reserved to the last extremity ; then, perhaps, 
the clock goes ; and, to the appeal of cheeks that have 
lost their roses, and hollow, hungry eyes, one article of 
furniture after another, — for mouths must be fed and 
cries stilled — till the room is clean dismantled. 

By this time Thomson has recovered from his illness ; 
and, though with impaired strength, sits down to resume 
work. One by one the articles are redeemed : and in 
the order of their necessity tor household comforts, con- 
venience, and economy — first the blankets and bed- 
clothes are taken out of pa^vn ; then the wife's gown ; 
the children's shoes : the furniture — chairs and tables, 
pots and pans. But this occupies long months j and 
before the Sunday clothes, the last to be taken out, are 
redeemed, a period has elapsed long enough to change 
the habits, and with them the destiny, of this unfortunate 
man. *' The first Sabbath," said one to me, talking with 
him on this subject, " I remained at home, I felt very 



234 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

uncomfortable ; the second was less disagreeable ; I felt 
pretty much at ease on the third ; and by the fourth, 
fifth, or sixth Sunday I got quite accustomed to it." So 
sinks Thomson into the condition of a non-church-goer. 
Before his Sabbath clothes are redeemed, his Sabbath 
habits are lost. Nor is that all. At first, ashamed to 
be seen, he keeps his room while others worship in the 
house of God ; but Sunday time hangs heavy on his 
hands, and by-and-by, he seeks the companionship of 
the non- church-goers around him. Drink is called in to 
enliven the dull hours. Ere long the debauches of Sun- 
day are commenced on Saturday night, and continued on 
through Monday. Peace flies the household. Hatred, 
bickerings, and mutual recriminations take the place of 
domestic happiness. His children get ragged ; and, 
ceasing to go to school, are initiated into vice on the 
streets. His wife, once a bright, tidy, frugal, industrious 
woman, grows a broken-down, dirty slattern ; and at 
length she also, who long had tried by all the kind, 
winning arts of woman to stem the tide and reclaim her 
infatuated husband, loses heart, and in downright despe- 
ration flies to the bottle. Now a fire is lighted, the 
funereal pile of all domestic peace, happiness, goodness, 
and virtue, around which devils may dance. The sin 
and misery which follow may be seen in yonder room, 
five storeys high in the Lawnmarket, where a father and 
mother sit by a fireless hearth, besotted ; in brutal in- 
difference to the state of the emaciated, ragged children 
around them; of their eldest girl lost, walking the streets; 
of their eldest son lying there in the last stage of con- 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATR. 225 

sumption on a pallet of straw, from which, with cruel 
hands, they had plucked the very blankets we had given 
for a covering to his wasted form — selling them for ac- 
cursed drink. 

May God confound the counsels of such as, caring no 
more for the poor than Judas, seek — either for their own 
pleasures or from the sordid desire for wealth — to under- 
mine the church-going habits of our people. Look at 
these unwashed, haggard, sloppy, slobbering, half-be- 
sotted men who are to be seen in numbers wandering 
our streets each Monday! Were they at church the 
day before ? Do they belong to the class of Sabba- 
tarians, as some are reproachfully called? In nine 
hundred and ninety-nine cases out of a thousand, those 
who worship on the Sabbath work on the Monday ; and 
they who spend the latter day in idleness and dissipa- 
tion neglect the assembling of themselves together. 
Even those who, to excuse their own lax conduct, ridi- 
cule the advocates of hallowed Sabbaths, know perfectly 
well that such as give up attendance on the house of 
God are on the road to ruin. For were they required to 
fill an office of great pecuniary trust, I venture to say, 
that they would appoint one who kept holy the Lord's 
day rather than one who was known to spend it in 
worldly business or amusements. 

But to return to the subject more immediately on 
hand : the habits of many are, as is illustrated by the 
case of the cobbler, due more to their misfortunes than 
to their crimes. In consequence of the separation of 
the wealthy from the poor — of those who could have 

Q 



226 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

given help from those who needed it, they were left to 
sink under their misfortunes. There was none to push 
a plank to the drowning man : to lend a hand ; in his 
time of need to prove a friend indeed — while no such 
providential circumstance occurred in their history as in 
that of one I knew ; and which was as follows. Late on 
a Saturday evening I recollected having visited a few 
days before the house of a widow whom I found struggling, 
by the sale of whiting, vegetables, and such things, to 
maintain herself and four young children. Though I 
could not have assigned any particular reason for it, I 
became very urgent, while recommending my wife to 
carry her custom to that shop, that she should send the 
servant that very night to buy some things. Unreason- 
able as this haste seemed, the servant was accordingly 
despatched ; nor was she long in returning — the kind 
heart of the honest country lass, who had never seen 
cruel want before, melting with pity. She had found the 
room, which was both house and shop, without a morsel 
of food — neither a cabbage-head nor a handful of meal 
for the Lord's day. The mother was sitting "vvith the 
infant on her arm, and the other children cowering at 
her knee, crying in bitter, helpless sorrow. They had 
not tasted food from the morning. AVhat a Sabbath was 
in prospect? Of course supplies were instantly pro- 
vided. Not only so, but steps were taken to set them 
on their feet ; and the case turned out one to keep up 
hands that were ready to hang down amid many sad 
discouragements. One needs to be cheered with suc- 
cess now and then. The widow earned her bread with 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 227 

patient, honest industry; though they had a hard fight 
for it, the children got a fair education : and I have 
lived to enjoy the pleasure of seeing all that family .grow 
up to be well-to-do men and women, who dutifully re- 
turned their mother's kindness ; and tenderly watching by 
her death-bed, closed her eyes when she died in the 
peace of the faith. That Saturday night was the crisis of 
this widow's history. But for the seasonable and provi- 
dential supply thro^vn into her house, her Sabbath attire, 
as in other cases, would most probably have gone into 
pawn ; and that — ^like the letting out of waters — might 
have proved, as it has done in a thousand other instances, 
the beginning of the end, \SMtfacilis descensus in Averno. 
The evils which arise in our large towns from the 
almost entire separation of the different classes of society, 
are not to be remedied by restoring matters to their old 
condition. That is impossible. *' Birds of a feather," 
says the old proverb, " flock together : " and ever since 
their old city walls have been cast down, and the in- 
habitants are no longer locked up at night within gates 
and bars, the general mass has exhibited a tendency to 
separate into its individual parts — the different classes 
herding together; the highest and lowest living far 
apart. But love and Christian kindness have provided 
a remedy for evils which it is beyond the power of law 
to cure. I shall show that to my readers — and how 
much may be done, through churches and Christian 
organizations, to apply the wealth and piety of the 
better-conditioned classes to the elevation of those which 
have sunk into poverty and crime ; and how by this 



228 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

means, as by the channels that ctonvey a living stream 
from fountain, lake, or river to irrigate and fertilise 
barren fields, the widerness, to use the beautiful lan- 
guage of Scripture, is become an Eden, and the desert 
a garden of the Lord. We have such gardens, as I shall 
show, in the Cowgate and elsewhere — green and beau- 
tiful as the oasis of a desert. 

Thus those whom God has made of one flesh and 
blood, though Hving apart, have been brought together 
to the benefit of both ; and to the getting rid of preju- 
dices which go unfortunately to widen the gulf that 
separate them. We have mingled with both classes, the 
highest and the lowest ; and are persuaded that, if they 
knew each other better, they would respect each other 
more. It is by no means uncommon to find people in 
the upper ranks who fancy that the lower classes regard 
them with em^-, and are seeking to rise on their ruins ; 
at least to drag them down to the same low level with 
themselves. Thanks to a gracious God, no such feelings 
embitter the bread of labour. The sons of toil com- 
monly accept their lot without a grudge ; and with the 
ruddy light of a humble hearth gleaming in the bright, 
laughing eyes of their domestic circle, are as content 
with their condition as the greatest and proudest in the 
land. 

People who fancy that the working-classes must envy 
them the possession of their luxuries — those tables, ser- 
vants, carriages, and state which it would make them 
miserable to be deprived of— forget that what man never 
had, he never misses . and that God has imparted such 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 229 

pleasure to the use of our faculties — be they those of the 
body or of the mind — to a life of labour, in fact, that 
many of the upper classes, flying from ennui and idle- 
ness, undergo harder work to find amusement than most 
working-men to find bread. I have seen a stalwart 
ploughman at the close of day, standing by his cottage 
door beneath a bower of roses and honeysuckle, while he 
dandled a crowing, laughing infant in his arms, stop his 
happy play for a moment to gaze at the gay equipage 
that swept by. But only for a moment. The summer- 
dust had not settled on the road, the spokes were still 
flashing in sight, the clatter of hoofs and sound of wheels 
were still heard, when the rustic Hercules, with health 
on his ruddy cheek and sun-browned brow, without an 
envious look cast on wealth or rank, resumed his play, 
and made the welkin ring with light-hearted laughter. 
No doubt there are dark and malignant spirits every- 
where ; but if the working-classes have a fault, it is that, 
wherever a due regard is shown to their feelings and a 
proper interest taken in their welfare by those above 
them, they are too ready to worship them — furnishing an 
illustration of the old proverb, "The king's chafi'is better 
than other people's corn." 

Then, again, the humbler classes have only to know 
the higher better to know that they have their full share 
of kindly and human sympathy; and that the upper 
regions of society resemble not those cold, naked, and 
barren heights where no sweet flowers grow, nor sparkling 
fountains spring, nor creatures live but birds of prey, that 
descend from their rocky nests to ravage the plains below. 



23© SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

When expatiating amid a circle of the highest rank on 
the worth of many of the humbler classes, or telling some 
story illustrative of their sufferings and sorrows, I have 
ever found ready listeners, and seen tears of kindliest 
sympathy standing in eyes that some would persuade 
the poor regard them only with scorn and contempt. 
" Scratch a Russian," said Napoleon I., "and you will 
find a Tartar below." My experience is, that you have 
only to get through the outer crust and shell to find in 
all ranks those God-implanted feelings of humanity and 
brotherhood which, in circumstances favourable to their 
action, would draw the different classes of society into 
closer, kinder proximity. There is great need for this. 
Would the wealthy, the worthy, the well-conditioned, 
personally visit the degraded districts of our towns, they 
would, after all I and others have said of city sins and 
sorrows, return to use, though in a quite different sense 
from hers, the words of the Queen of Sheba, " The half 
was not told me." Let them but venture down into the 
pit, and their hearts would be so touched with the scenes 
of misery and wretchedness amid which they found them- 
selves, that they themselves would be miserable till they 
were remedied — until at least in their exertions to heal 
the wounds under which humanity lay bleeding, they 
earned the praise of Him who said, "She hath done 
what she could." 

Another cause lies in the neglect of their wants and 
interests. 

At the period of the Reformation in Scotland, John 
Kjiox proposed a division of the property of the Church 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 93I 

of Rome so remarkable for its piety and patriotism, as 
to entitle that much-abused man to be regarded as the 
greatest of the Reformers. He regarded the property as 
sacred to the public good ; and proposed to divide into 
four equal parts what the country needed, but rapacious 
nobles devoured — one to go to the support of the poor ; 
another to form livings for the ministers of the Gospel ; 
the third to maintain the fabrics of schools and churches ; 
and the remaining fourth to provide salaries for teachers 
in parish schools, rectors of grammar schools in the chief 
towns of the provinces, and professors in the four Uni- 
versities. Along with his large and enlightened views on 
the subject of education, Knox held that no man had a 
right to live in society and rear his children in savage 
ignorance; but should be compelled, if neglecting the 
duty he owed both to his family and the community, to 
send his children to school. But his noble aspirations 
and wise plans for the Church and country were, so far 
as this scheme was concerned, frustrated. The Crown, 
and Lords, and Lairds seized the spoil; all that the 
ministers of religion obtained being a grudged and 
wretched pittance; while it was only after a struggle, 
extending over more than a century, that they succeeded 
in establishing those parish schools which have been the 
boast ot Scotland, and the best inheritance of her chil- 
dren. It would have been vain, either in Scotland or in 
England, to even attempt what the Dutch accomplished 
in Holland, where they made provision that the number 
of ministers and of churches should increase pari passu 
with the population. This arrangement reflects much 



332 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATK. 

credit on the sagacity of the Dutch. No such provision 
being made, nor in the circumstances of the case being 
possible in our country, when the population of many of 
our parishes, with the increase of trade and the improve- 
ments of agriculture, increased to double, triple, quad- 
ruple its original amount, the one parish church became 
little else than a mockery. Unable to accommodate 
perhaps a fifth or a tenth of the population, it illustrated 
the graphic words of Scripture, " The bed is shorter than 
that a man can stretch himself on it ; the covering nar- 
rower than that he can wrap himself in it." 

The pastor who could have managed a flock number 
ing one or two thousand, found himself in some instances 
minister of a parish with twice, ten, or twenty times as 
many ; and fifty years, or a century ago, it was but little 
that voluntary efforts, either within or without the Esta- 
blished Church, did to remedy the evil. Some ministers 
of overgrown parishes, strange to say, were silly enough 
to boast of the number of their parishioners ; while others 
who felt their responsibility, were paralysed under a sense 
of their impracticable, and indeed impossible duties. Set 
a man to empty a pool, and he will go vigorously to 
work. Give him an impracticable task, require him to 
empty a lake or sea, and after a few efforts he probably 
abandons the attempt in despair, and either sits down to 
fold his hands in absolute idleness, or betakes himself in 
search of happiness to other pursuits. Nothing indeed 
can altogether excuse the carelessness of many of the 
ministers in Edinburgh some century ago. It appears, 
from Carlyle's Memoirs, that they spent their days in the 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 1^3 

cultivation of literature, and their evenings in taverns, 
drinking claret ; meanwhile their flocks wandered as sheep 
without a shepherd ; and it was little they did, or attempted 
to provide for the wants of the population, and stem the 
tide of vice, wretchedness, and irreligion, which was rising 
to engulf huge districts and large masses of the people. 

The evils arising from an increase of population, for 
which no adequate provision was made, were greatly 
aggravated to the humbler classes of society by the intro- 
duction of a system that turned the name of " parish 
church " into a mockery, and the appointment of a popu- 
lar minister into a positive calamity to the parishioners. 
Strange to say, the more devout and able the minister, so 
much the worse for the poor. A result which happened 
thus. The members of the municipal corporation in 
whose hands the property and patronage were invested, 
wanted money for some object — good or bad. For this 
purpose, when a clergyman of popular gifts was appointed 
to one of the city churches, they put on a screw in the 
shape of high seat-rents ; thereby excluding the poor from 
their own parish church — which got filled by the wealthy 
from other quarters. The humbler and poorer classes, 
driven from their place of worship, sank into careless and 
irreligious habits ; while the clergyman, having his hands 
fully occupied with the work of a congregation drawn 
from all quarters of the city, had little or no time to 
bestow on his parishioners. The interests of the poor, 
for whom the benefits of an Establishment were chiefly 
intended, were sacrificed to the tastes of the rich, and 
the pecuniary embarrassments of ill-managed raunicipali* 



134 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

ties. Mammon sat enthroned within the house of God—' 
ruling with a high hand. The poor did not so much 
break away, as they were cut adrift, from the Church and 
the ordinances of divine worship ; and who will not say 
that they, in these circumstances, were less sinners in 
the sight of God than those, whether patrons or pastors, 
who, treating them with neglect and robbing them of 
their birthrights, as the Bible says of the Kings of Israel, 
" made them to sin." 

For this evil also, as I shall show, our age has pro- 
vided a suitable and most successful remedy. I refer 
to those Home Missionary schemes which, selecting a 
manageable section in these dark and dreary districts, 
plant there a school with its teacher and a church with 
its minister and staff of agents — saying to them. This is 
your sphere : work this field ; by assiduous care, and the 
Dmnipotence of Christian love, " compel them to come 
i^n." The success of this instrumentality has surpassed 
the fondest expectations ; and than the reports of these 
Missions, no accounts more cheering come from heathen 
ands and the isles that are afar off. 

Another^ and i7ideed chief, cause lies in Drunkenness. 

The simple absence of good influences, like a want of 
jhowers and sunshine to the soil, will account for many 
of our evils ; but, like the bitter waters that reduced the 
plain of Jericho to barrenness, drunkenness, which as- 
sumes its most hideous form where ardent spirits are the 
favourite stimulant, is the main cause of the social, moral, 
and physical evils of our country. But for this vice, how 
high we could hold our heads before those nations of the 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 23J 

Continent, among whom, notwithstanding their sobriety, 
licentiousness prevails to an extent happily unknown even 
in the least virtuous districts of our country. I know 
that some, from antipathy to our religious fervour and 
hallowed Sabbaths, represent us as being, in the observ- 
ance of the seventh Commandment of the Decalogue, no 
better, and rather worse, than the French, Germans, and 
Italians. We have elsewhere brought this matter to the 
test of statistics so far as France is concerned, and proved 
it to be a vile and groundless libel. Our country comes 
as honourably out of a comparison with Italy, as I ascer- 
tained during a visit paid to that country last spring. 
The ^^Sagefemme qui prend des Pensionnaires'^'' which one 
reads everywhere on the streets of France, does not tell 
a plainer tale than those establishments which, in the 
form of Foundling Hospitals, provide secrecy and safety 
to vice ; and disgraceful as are the scenes our streets 
present, I regard them as less dangerous to good morals, 
and as presenting a less unfavourable symptom of the 
social condition of a country, than such institutions as I 
saw in Italy. Here is a vast pile of building ; and who 
watches in its neighbourhood by night may see a female 
form approaching with muffled face, and in her arms 
something which she conceals by the folds of her cloak. 
Stealing along under the shadow of the lofty houses, she 
reaches the steps that lead up to a vast, open porch. 
She quickly crosses it ; making, not for either of the two 
doors that admit into the inside of the building, but to a 
niche in the wall between them. An open box, which 
turns on a pivot, stands there, and a bell-rope hangs close 



236 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

by. She stops at the curious niche, and unfolds the 
cloak. There is an infant on her arm. She bends over 
it for a moment, and kisses it; while some tears fall on 
its sleeping face. Now, pressing it once more to her 
bosom, she lays it in the box ; seizes the rope ; rings the 
bell ; and the little machine, turning round, carries the 
poor infant inside, and leaves her without, to return to a 
life of vice and habits which such arrangements enable 
her to practise with impunity — protected from the sorrow, 
shame, and burdens that God ordained to be the penalties 
and checks of crime. 

A means this, as a Neapolitan gentleman told me, of 
preventing infanticide, in which the remedy is worse than 
the disease. There were fewer cases of child-murder in 
this island were our judges and juries to execute justice 
on the perpetrators of a crime so monstrous. Still, better 
a few children were murdered than the morals of the 
country be undermined by establishing and endowing 
Foundling Hospitals. It is a false benevolence. Let us 
shield those who are innocently involved in the conse- 
quences of others' guilt ; but it is not wise or well to 
save the guilty from suffering. Pain is the divinely 
appointed guardian as well of our morals as of our health 
and life ; and we cannot afford to remove any of the 
fences that protect the virtue of society. Let us remove 
every impediment from the path of virtue, but none from 
that of vice. There is Httle need to make the descent 
easier and more inviting. Alas ! when the road is roughest 
" many there be that find it." Wliat inducement have we 
to assimilate our institutions to those of other nations ? 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 337 

None — the result of my inquiries being that we can hold 
up our heads unblushingly in presence of Italians as of 
French, so far as moral purity is concerned, and espe- 
cially that conjugal fidelity for which — notwithstanding 
the cases in our Divorce Courts and those details which 
many of our newspapers disgrace themselves by publish- 
ing — our country stands pre-eminent, and thereby stands 
secure against all assailants. A faithful observance of 
the marriage "League and Covenant" is eminently calcu- 
lated to form a great people ; and, all thanks to God, the 
greatness, peace, and prosperity of Britam afford happy 
evidence of the truth of the sa)dng, " The hearthstone is 
the best foundation of society !" 

But on turning to the vice of drunkenness, to use the 
words of Ezra, " We blush, and are ashamed to lift up 
the head." Whatever may have been the case once, now, 
happily, it does not pervade all classes of society — our 
middle and upper classes being almost as sober as those 
of the Continent. But there are large masses of our 
labouring population, especially in its best-paid and also 
in its lowest grades, that are the slaves of this most de- 
grading, and abominable, yet betwitching vice. Foi 
example, during a visit of nearly three months paid to the 
Continent in spring, I was in Paris, Lyons, Marseilles, 
Nice, Genoa, Leghorn, Rome, Naples, Florence, Bologna, 
Turin, Macon — all large towns : and on my return, I 
saw in Edinburgh, as I would have seen in London oi 
Liverpool, more drunken people in three days than I 
encountered on the Continent during these ten or eleven 
weeks. Sad aiid shameful as this is, it is due to oui 



1^9 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

country and its religion to say, that all the drunkards I 
saw belonged to the lowest class in the community. 
Nothing were more unfair than to have regarded them as 
types of the nation — the case being one where the adage 
was quite inapplicable, £^x uno disce omnes 1 

Now, nowhere is this debauched and drunken class to 
be found in such numbers as in the dark, dingy, godless 
quarters of our large towns. Into these they sink like 
mud. They crowd together in houses often foul as pig- 
styes — squalid and sickly ; rags on their backs ; some- 
times fierce passions, but usually hopeless degradation, 
in their looks. The parents go to no church ; the hap- 
less children are sent to no school. There is generally 
no Bible in their houses, frequently no bed. " Dark 
places of the earth " indeed " they are, full of cruelty " 
— the health, the morals, the very lives of thousands of 
poor, innocent children being as certainly sacrificed year 
by year to parental vices as, in the days of old, they 
were sacrificed to parental superstition who were cast 
into the fires of Moloch. These are the quarters that 
contribute most deaths to swell the bills of mortality ; 
and although I sympathise with every attempt to im- 
prove their dwellings, and have almost sometimes wished 
for a good roaring fire to clear away the courts, closes, 
and alleys where improvement seems impossible, the 
great mortality of children among this class is due, less 
to the want of a sufiicient supply of good air, than to 
the drunkenness of mothers who poison the milk in their 
breasts, and of fathers who waste the wages that should 
procure for their children food and clothing — comforts 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. a-\q 

.mdispensable to their health and lives. 'Tis not the love 
of money, but of drink, that may be called " the root 
of all evil " in such quarters. And alas for those poor 
wretches, who, if not lost to all sense of shame, have 
lost all power of resistance ! Drinking-shops, licensed 
by our magistrates and justices, beset them behind and 
before. They cannot repair to their daily work, they 
cannot travel ten yards along the street, without being 
exposed to temptations which many are as incapable 
of resisting as a piece of iron is the attraction of a 
magnet. These shops, with their open doors, and flaring 
gas, and rubicund, wily keepers, who fatten like bloated 
spiders on the heedless flies entangled in their nets, 
are the sign as well as the cause of poverty and degrada- 
tion. Planted thickest where they should be thinnest, 
they abound most where poverty most abounds. This 
most cruel and unjust treatment of our poor people has 
almost defeated every eff"ort which Christian men and 
women have made to reform their habits and raise them 
out of the " Slough of Despond." Let a man set him- 
self to improve their dwellings, to exchange their rags 
for decent attire, to send their children to school, to 
train them to habits of providence through savings banks 
or friendly societies, to bring them out of their dark 
houses to the house of God, and whatever be the path 
of Christian benevolence he selects, the demon of drink 
starts up to bestride it, to bar his way, to neutralise his 
efforts, to disappoint his dearest hopes, and make him 
almost sit down despairingly — to cry with the prophet, 
•* Oh that my head were waters, and mine eyes a foun« 



240 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

tain of tears, that I might weep day and night for the 
slain of the daughter of my people ! " 

When labouring, which I did for nearly seven years, 
among these classes, I saw so clearly that drink stood as 
the great impediment in the way of doing them good, 
that, to induce them to abandon it, I myself became a 
total abstainer. I hoped my precepts would have more 
weight when they were backed by my example. And 
almost all, whether men or women, who have devoted 
themselves to the improvement of such districts — a very 
self-denying work — have found it indispensable to follow 
the same course. Many have entered on the duties of 
home or city missionaries without being total abstainers ; 
but — and this is a remarkable fact — few of them have 
passed six months at the work till they found it absolutely 
necessary, if they were to do any good, to preach, and, offer- 
ing themselves as patterns, to practise total abstinence. 
That fact speaks volumes. We do not believe in total ab- 
stinence as a substitute for the Gospel; but we do believe 
that drinking-habits, like the tombstone at the grave of 
Lazarus, stand an all but insuperable barrier between the 
living and the dead ; and must be removed before we can 
entertain the hope that their victims will hear or obey the 
voice which addresses the dead — saying, " Come forth ! " 

Another cause lies in the irruption of floods of low 
Roman Catholic Irish. 

These form about one-fourth of the population of 
Glasgow, a sixth or so of that of Liverpool,* and a for- 

* At the Liverpool Borough Jail there is a Roman Catholic chap- 
laio. He «ys : — ** In reference to tlie total number of commitments 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 24I 

midable proportion of the inhabitants of all our manu- 
facturing towns. Nor are they " hewers of wood and 
drawers of water " in these only ; but are spreading, like 
a moral plague, over many of our rural districts. 

" To buy in the cheapest and sell in the dearest 
market," without regard to other considerations, is the 
Gospel according to the World. To such political eco- 
nomy we hesitate not to prefer the maxims of God's 
Word, and the principles of One who said, " The faithful 
of the land, he shall serve me," — " I will not suffer a 
wicked person," — " He that telleth lies shall not tarry in 
my sight." What has resulted from buying human labour 
in the cheapest market without any regard to the moral 
and religious interests of the country? Our manufac- 
turers and even farmers have encouraged hordes of Irish 
Papists to settle among us ; and we are discovering, when 
too late, that their cheap labour will prove dear in the 
end. Thousands of our sober, virtuous, well-conditioned 
working-classes, whose wages would have risen but for 
the supply of cheap labour which Ireland threw into the 
market, have betaken themselves to the Colonies; and 
in their place — a bad and costly exchange — we have got 
an ignorant, rude, bigoted race, who flutter in rags, lodge 

for the year, it will be found that 3,083 Roman Catholic females 
were committed against 1,812 Protestants, thus giving a majority of 
1,271. The number of CathoHc prostitutes is so great, and the 
means of helping those who wish to abandon the streets so limited, 
that I give the numbers in full." From the figures given by the 
reverend gentleman, it appears that, in the months from January to 
September, 605 Protestants and 921 Romanists of the class in ques- 
tion were committed. 



242 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 



in hovels, and, worst of all, having their eyes and ears 
shut by their priests, remain impervious to those improv- 
ing influences which, with their undoubted cleverness and 
emotional nature, would convert the Irish into valuable 
members oi society. They have suffered such centuries 
of cruel wrong, that we should not be astonished at their 
hatred of the Saxon ; and that they entertain, more almost 
than any other Roman Catholic people, the bitterest 
prejudice against the Protestant faith. But, however we 
may thus in fairness account for, and in charity excuse, 
their hostilities and habits, their cheap labour has been 
no boon, and their presence among us no blessing to the 
country. As we could prove by statistics, they have 
added enormously to our poor rates, and form a com- 
paratively large proportion of our criminals ; while, like 
the foul stream which pollutes the pool it enters, they 
have lowered the habits of our people, wherever they 
have happened to mingle. 

It is due to the Irish Roman Catholics to say, that 
personally I have no reason to say a word against them. 
As minister first of the parish of Old Greyfi iars, and after- 
wards of St. John's, I received all reasonable courtesy al 
their hands — save on only two occasions. In the one case, 
I was seated on a stool in the humble apartm»!'nt of an old 
ricketty house, noting down the names of the children as 
I got them from their mother, when the door of a closet 
biu'st open, and out bounced a man, her husband, with- 
out his coat. Striding across the floor, with fists clenched 
and eyes on fire, he planted himself before me, saying in 
^n unmistakeable brogue, " You begone — out wv y^ — T*ll 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 243 

have none of you Protestants — out, away wi' ye ! " So 
he raged and foamed. I rose ; and being satisfied that, 
seeing my presence was not " contemptible " like Paul's, 
he would use no violence, still less attempt to toss me 
out at the window, I told him to take it easy ; that I 
would go, but there was no occasion for such hot haste 
— and so resumed my seat, resolved, if possible, to mol- 
lify this raging lion. Poor fellow, it was not ill to do — 
he proving, like most of his countrymen, very open to 
kindness. The Apostle Paul won people by guile ; and 
I thought it worth while to try whether I could not win 
over my antagonist, and get into his good graces by help 
of the potato. So I started the subject, and healed the 
breach ; or, rather, made an opening into his heart j and 
once in, embraced the opportunity to drop some seeds of 
divine truth, which I left God to bless. 

The other case was an encounter I had with a woman, 
whom her own country people pronounced a red-hot 
Catholic. She flew at me like a wild cat, and with a 
bearing of uncommon insolence, challenged me again 
and again to a theological discussion. She was in no 
temper to be convinced, far less converted ; and though, 
for her ignorance was on a par with her insolence, a vic- 
tory might have been easily won, I felt that there would 
have been little glory, and less good, in putting her hors 
iU combat ; and therefore declined to lift her gage of 
batthi. Very probably I would have found my antago- 
nist, and the other Irish who were present, incapable of 
appreciating the weight of reasons ; most of them being 
satisfied with the silly arguments in favoiu* of Popery 

R 2. 



244 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE, 

they learn from their priests. With one of these s.lie 
kept hammering away at me — this, namely, Is the father, 
or the grandfather, the better man? She meant, oi 
course, that Popery, for which she claimed the relation 
of grandfather, was the old, original, and true faith ; and 
I did not think it worth while to answer this — a fair spe- 
cimen of the arguments which the priests throw, as dust, 
in the eyes of the people — beyond quietly saying, as I 
left the house, " My good friend, keep your temper ; 
there is no question which is the better man : the ques- 
tion is, to take your way of putting it, which is the 
father, and which the grandfather ? Your Popery is a, 
comparatively modern invention. The doctrines of Pro- 
testantism are as old as the Bible, and were, as you 
should find if you would only read it, those of the Church 
of God, long centuries before there was Pope or Papist 
on earth." The absolute trash which, as arguments for 
Popery, passes current among these poor people, is 
almost incredible, and were ludicrous if their conse- 
quences were not melancholy — as for example : — 

" Your riverence " (for this term they bestow on Pro- 
testant ministers, heretics though they are taught to con- 
sider them), said a denizen of the Grassmarket, " I will 
not change — not I." 

"Why?" 

" Bekase mine is the thruly Scriptural religion." 

"How, fiiend, do you prove that? — a very ex- 
traordinary assertion to come from you, a Roman 
Catholic." 

" Bekase, your riverince, don't you see it must be so ; 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 245 

since there is an Epistle in the Bible to the Romans, but 
none to the Presbatairians ! " 

It was, I may remark, more the old Popery the Irish 
brought with them, than the influence of the priests, 
which made the Roman Catholic element in the Cowgate 
a difficult one to deal with, when I laboured there. It 
is alleged that the Romish priests take more pains to 
seduce silly women from the faith than to minister to the 
wants and improve the habits of the poor and low among 
their own followers. And, so far as my experience goes, 
perhaps I ought to believe it; seeing that during the 
seven years I visited the Cowgate and its neighbourhood 
— where there were many Papists— I never met or saw a 
priest, by day or night, in court, close, or alley, minister- 
ing either to the spiritual or temporal wants of the poor. 
Other duties may possibly have occupied them. Any 
way, let us not blame the men, but blame, and hate, and 
uproot a system, the natural effect of which is to dehu- 
manise its priests, destroy the domestic and kindlier 
affections of their nature, and make the Church, as they 
call it, father, mother, brother, sister, child, lover, friend, 
country, all in all to them. 

Roused to activity by the great, and, as I shall show, 
successful efforts which have been made to evangelize 
our dark and destitute districts, the priests of Rome may 
probably now-a-days be oftener met in the Cowgate and 
its neighbourhood. Perhaps they have taken such alarm 
as they did in the matter of Ragged Schools. Till Pro- 
testants bestirred themselves on behalf of the neglected 
outcasts of our streets, Rome left her children to igno- 



246 SKETCHES OF THE COW GATE. 

ranee, beggary, and misery; nor did her priests take ai.y 
steps to set up a Ragged School in the land till there was 
a chance of the poor Roman Catholic children getting 
God's unadulterated truth at those which Protestants had 
established. 

It is, I may remark, to the revived activity of the 
Popish Church, as well as to the great influx of an Irish 
population, that we are chiefly to attribute her boasted 
increase of chapels and convents, priests, monks, and 
nuns. Popery, in fact, is more a difficulty than a danger 
— a disease which it is difficult to cure more than one 
which there is much reason to fear will take the form of 
an epidemic, and spread. How the doom of Babylon is 
to be accomplished is known to Him who has foretold, 
and will accomplish it. But no great change is likely to 
be effected on her by influences from without. What 
State or Church was ever either reformed or overthrown 
but by movements that began within her own bosom ? — 
controversies and the attacks of foreign assailants seem- 
ing only in most cases to confirm and rivet men in error. 
The priests of Rome, though they appear unable to ele- 
vate the habits of their people, have sufficient influence 
over them to shut their eyes and ears against the truth ; 
so that, unless God interfere in some extraordinary way, 
I have small hope of anything that w^e can do telling on 
her adult population. As is proved by the United States 
of America, where Popery would have been almost ex- 
tinguished but for the large annual emigration of Roman 
Catholics from Ireland, it is by the education of the 
young that we are to drive a wedge into the mass. 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 147 

and rend it asunder. Since 1833 the Legislature has 
affirmed in fourteen separate Acts of Parliament that the 
child, as a member of society, has a right to piotection 
from the injury of premature labour. Let the Legislature 
also affirm that children, as members of society, have a 
right to protection from the injury of ignorance, and take 
security that they receive — where nothing more can be 
given — at least, a good secular education. Leaving the 
parent to choose the school, let society, as well for its 
own protection as for that of the child, insist that every 
child shall be taught the three R.'s, as they are called, 
viz., Reading, Writing, and Arithmetic ; and I am per- 
suaded that the rising generation of Roman Catholics 
would grow up with such powers, and, in this free country, 
with such habits of thinking, that they would betimes 
shake off their yoke. Britain, as America is doing, 
would eliminate that pestilential. Popish element to 
which the country owes so much of her existing poverty, 
misery, and degradation. 

In consequence of those causes which I have, and of 
others which I might have, mentioned, the condition of 
the lowest classes in our cities is deplorable. It must be 
seen to be fully known. But some idea may be formed 
of it from such facts as the following ; and I may add 
that what is true of Edinburgh is equally true of all other 
large cities in the island. 

In Edinburgh there are 13,209 families, each residing 
in one room ; and 1 2 1 of these rooms are without even 
one window. In such circumstances, how can purity of 
morals and decency of manners exist ? 



248 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

Though there was not one pawn-shop in Scotland till 
1S06, there are more than 1000 now — of big and wee 
pawns, as they are called. Of these, the Glasgow City- 
Mission says : — " They are the most pvolific nurseries of 
crime — the most powerful and degrading enemies with 
which we have to contend in our work among the pooi." 
This statement I fully endorse ; having found that the 
ruin of the poor was in almost every case begun — indeed, 
I might say accomplished — so soon as they turned their 
steps to the pawn-shop. 

The extent to which this ready but ruinous way of 
raijing money on body-clothes, bed-clothes, books, and 
furiaiture, is carried on, appears from these facts : 

Thirty thousand articles are put in pawn every week ; 

Eleven thousand articles were in one month put in 
pawn in a single office situated in a poor district of the 
city; 

Twenty thousand pounds, or about that sum, are 
lost year by year to the poorest of the people from 
inability to redeem the articles which they have pawned. 

Mr. Knox, in a very interesting brochure called 
" Glimpses of the Social Condition of Edinburgh," men- 
tions the case of one man whose house was stripped of 
everything, and his daughters left unable to cross the 
door — their mother having stolen and pledged their 
things while they slept; and also that of another man, 
vho, though earning eighteen shillings per week, and 
with his own hand <lisbursing his wages, was unable to 
keep his house or cliildren from misery through the faci- 
lities the pawn-shops afforded his wife for raising money 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 249 

to buy drink. Three or four times she had stripped her- 
self and her children, leaving barely rags to cover them : 
emptying the house of everything she could carry away — 
the bed-clothes, the clock, the very pots and pans. It is 
hardly necessary to add that the husband got to no 
church, and the children to no school. 

To mention one among many instances known to my- 
self of the wretchedness and ruin produced by these 
shops, I knew a man, in a respectable position of life, 
whose house had been so often plundered and devas- 
tated by his wife carrying the household goods to the 
pawn-shop to procure money for drink, that he had at 
length to come to terms with her. He allowed her one 
bottle of whiskey, and before she died two bottles, per 
day. Incredible as it may appear, she swallowed that 
quantity. 

Public-houses, these demoralisers of the people, are so 
numerous in Edinburgh — and this city is not worse in 
that respect than many others both in England and 
Scotland — that were they put down in a line, with an 
average frontage of 27I feet, they would reach a length 
of not less than four miles ! 

Drawing their gains chiefly from the wages of working- 
men, they swallow up — and this is one of the least of 
their evils — more than 400,000/. per year ! 

On one Saturday night from seven to eleven o'clock 
the numbers who entered ten of these public-houses were 
counted, and each of them was on an average entered by 
610 — men and women, boys and girls ! 

The sad and terrible results of all these malign influ- 



2SO SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

ences are to be seen in our prisons, our workhouses, and 
especially in our dingy, dark, crowded alleys, courts, 
lanes, and streets. The ph^^sical and moral degradation 
of their tenants is such, that the question which forces it- 
self on those who visit their houses and know their habits 
is, Can these dry bones live ? They can : as we now, in 
closing this paper, proceed to show. 

Gigantic as the evil is, the country and Churches hold 
the remedy in their hands if they will only use it — only 
rise, and, shaking off at once their lethargy and despair, 
address themselves to a task which will demand time, but, 
with God's blessing, is by no means impossible. Let the 
dwellings of the poor be improved — let the proprietors ot 
houses injurious to the health of the community be com- 
pelled to shut them up — let the tenants of every house^ 
and of every storey of every house, be provided with 
water and all other suitable conveniences ! But since 
the root of our evils lies chiefly in moral causes, it is to 
such moral remedies as education, religion, and the sym- 
pathies of humanity that we are chiefly to trust. These 
have been tried : nor have been found wanting. 

They were not fairly tried in days when it was thought 
enough to plant one city missionary in a district containing 
2000, 5000, or even 10,000 people. One jewel here, and 
another there, the good man might pick out. Good, no 
doubt, was done ; but none were more ready to acknow- 
ledge than the city missionaries themselves that the 
means then employed were totally inadequate to the 
end ; that it was impossible even for the most arduous 
and devoted missionary to produce by his single efforts 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 25 1 

any very palpable effect on the mass around him. Taught 
by painful failures, and years of comparatively fruitless 
work, Christian philanthropists have adopted a new sys- 
tem — one that, taken up and vigorously wrought by all 
the evangelical Churches acting in co-operation, would, 
in a few years, work such a change on the degraded dis- 
tricts of our cities that the Churches might, though with 
all humility, claim to have accomplished a greater work 
than that Caesar who boasted that he had found Rome 
brick, and had left it marble. 

The principle of the system is as plain as it is power- 
ful. It just lies in applying the worth and wealth, the 
influence and energies of a well-conditioned Christian 
congregation to the cultivation of a poor, neglected, but 
manageable, district. Let me relate, for example, an 
experiment made by my own congregation. 

We selected a district of the town, named The Plea- 
sance, and so called because in old times a religious 
house stood there, dedicated to Saint Placenza. It em- 
braced a population of 2000 people, of whom but a small 
number were Irish Roman CathoHcs. The mass were in 
a state of practical heathenism ; very few attending any 
house of God, and about two hundred children wander- 
ing neglected on the streets. Along with Dr. Hanna 
and myself, (the ministers of St. John's,) its office-bearers 
— numbering some thirty elders and as many deacons — 
resolved to raise the money, and provide the machinery 
necessary for cultivating that waste field. Having ap- 
pointed a missionary and a teacher, whom we undertook 
to support, we built a school where the children were to 



252 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

be taught during the week, and the people to worship on 
Sabbath. As the mountain would not come to Maho- 
met, it was resolved that Mahomet should go to the 
mountain. The people of the district must be visited in 
their houses, and, so to speak, compelled to come in. 
But this work was not left to the missionary and the 
teacher. Having divided the whole district into portions, 
so small that each contained only some six or seven 
families, we resolved that each of these minor divisions 
should have a visitor, whose duty it would be to visit the 
families once or twice a week ; to stir them out of their 
lethargy ; to counsel them ; to help them, by teaching 
them how to help themselves ; to improve their homes ; 
to wean them from drunkenness, to encourage habits of 
providence, cleanliness, and sobriety ; to prevail on them 
to send their children to school, and go tliemselves on 
the Lord's day to the House of God. Let it be parti- 
cularly observed that the division allotted to each visitor 
was so small that the working of it could neither be a 
heavy demand on their time, nor seriously interfere with 
any of their other duties. 

The plan having been arranged. Dr. Hanna and I ex- 
plained it from the pulpit, and made an appeal to our 
congregation ; asking them to supply us with money, but, 
above all, with agents. The appeal was instantly, and 
nobly responded to. The money was forthcoming, and 
some forty or fifty persons offered their services as visi- 
tors. With the wealth and worth of St. John's, we de- 
scended on the Pleasance. We had a devoted mis- 
sionary, a capital teacher, and some forty or fifty 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 253 

Christian agents at work there every week. Each Mon- 
day Dr. Hanna met with this staff; progress was re- 
ported j the blessings of Heaven were asked ; the coun- 
sels of wisdom given ; the zeal of the visitors stimulated j 
and the whole machinery kept oiled^ and in the best 
working order. Behold the result ! Ere long two hun- 
dred children were swept off the streets into the school. 
On the Lord's day the school began to fill with worship- 
pers. By-and-by, the cry, "Yet there is room," with 
which our agents went forth week by week, was changed 
into a demand for increased accommodation. A church 
must now be built ; and our congregation, encouraged 
by the remarkable success with which God had hitherto 
blest the work, rose to the occasion and built one. Mr. 
Cochrane, the missionary, was ordained as a regular 
minister ; and there he now labours, assisted by a full 
staff of elders and of deacons. His congregation, mainly 
made up of those who had been once living without God 
and without hope in the world, embraces 613 members 
in full communion ; and of these not less than two- 
thirds reside in the immediate neisrhbourhood. Once 

O 

sunk, degraded, and irreligious, neglecting the education 
of their children, neither contributing to the support of 
religious ordinances, nor even waiting on them, they now 
have a school overflowing with children, and a church over- 
flowing with worshippers. They pay fees for the education 
of their children ; and, with money saved from the dram- 
shop, come little short of providing a living for their 
minister, and meeting all the other expenses of divine 
worship. Christians have given their work, and Christ 



254 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

his blessing. The desert is blossoming like the rose ; 
and the lesson which I would press on my readers is, 
that what St. John's congregation has done in the Plea- 
sance may be equalled, if nor surpassed, by other con- 
gregations elsewhere. 

This is no singular or solitary case. Edinburgh can 
produce at least half-a-dozen such. We may take a 
future opportunity of setting forth these in detail. It 
is enough at present to say that the question, Can the 
people of these dark and degraded districts be raised to 
habits of decency, sobriety, and religion? has been solved 
— satisfactorily solved. The plan of attaching a poor, 
irreligious, destitute district to a Christian congregration, 
which shall charge itself with the duty of cultivating the 
barren field, has proved a great success. I believe no 
other plan will, or can, arrest the progress of vice and 
irreligion. A rising flood, this is threatening to over- 
whelm us : throne and altar : our country with its noble 
constitution and many blessed privileges. In the large 
towns our non-church-going population has been in- 
creasing year by year — at a fearful rate. In London, 
more than half the people are not in the habit of regu- 
larly attending any house of God. Do people consider 
that, unless this evil is vigorously checked, the propor- 
tion of the popul/ition which profess to fear God and 
take his Word as their rule of life, will by-and-by 
dwindle down into a comparatively small minority? 
They are a minority already; and it is impossible to 
regard the ultimate issues without serious alarm. How 
is the tide of avowed infidelity, or of practical irreligion, 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 2$$ 

to be Stayed — not only stayed, but rolled back ? Acts 
of Parliament cannot meet the emergency. The remedy 
is in the hands of the Christian Churches, and in no 
other hands. And should they neglect to apply it, they 
are without excuse. Let them lay aside their jealousies 
and, uniting together, march down in one unbroken 
front to attack the strongholds of ignorance, immorality, 
and irreligion, and they would carry them as by a grand 
assault. 

When the work is attempted by one congregation here 
and another there, the fruit of success is in a great mea- 
sure lost. For, so soon as a man or a family have had 
their habits changed, they usually change their home ; 
and fleeing the godless neighbourhood for their own 
sakes, and especially for that of their children, remove 
to some more decent quarter of the town. The vacancy 
their removal makes being supplied by incomers of low 
habits and from low quarters, those who labour to evan- 
gelise such isolated districts have the mortification of 
finding that their work is ever and anon to begin anew. 
The purified water is ever running out, and a foul stream 
running in — as fast as the land is cleared of weeds, it is 
fouled again from the neglected fields around it. This, 
as we know, is very disheartening ; nor is there any 
remedy for it but such a general co-operation on the 
part of all evangelical Churches as shall begin and carry 
on the work on a broad, catholic, and extensive scale, 
We are not to wait till that is done ; but why should it 
not be done now ? The glory of God, the salvation of 
precious souls, the very salvation of the country, requires 



256 SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 

this co-operation. The dark and destitute quarters of 
our towns being mapped out, let each congregation bring 
its worth and wealth to bear on the district assigned to 
it. Conventional privileges, jealous passions, and ancient 
prejudices must be sacrificed on the altar of our country ; 
for, however able and however willing, the work of evan- 
gelising our large towns is a task altogether beyond t\\^ 
power of any one Christian denomination. 

If they could, I would gladly see them do it. Nor, 
when a poor, miserable, wretched sinner was raised from 
the depths to sit at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his 
right mind, would I ever think, before I rejoiced, of in- 
quiring whether he had become an Episcopalian, or a 
Presbyterian, or an Independent, or a Baptist. If I be- 
lieved that any one of these Churches could singly save 
the perishing, could pluck them from the wreck, I would 
stand on the shore, and, whatever was the flag that flew 
at their mast-head, cheer them on to their glorious work. 
Let it not be said when the armies of Britain and of 
France, which we are old enough to remember meeting 
in bloody shock and dreadful struggle at Waterloo, as- 
saulted si/ie by side the strongholds of Sebastopol, that 
Christian Churches cannot co-operate in fighting a better 
battle and winning a nobler victory. May God give 
them his Spirit, that they may be *' like the children of 
Issachar, which were men that had understanding of the 
limes, to know what Israel ought to do." To stand 
apart on points of dignity, to contend about trifles, or 
even matters that are at the best but of secondary im- 
portance, to want that charity by which we might sweetly 



SKETCHES OF THE COWGATE. 257 

carry on the work together, and promote the common 
end for which Jesus, descending from his dignities, lived 
and suffered, and groaned and died, would be a scan- 
dalous spectacle and a fatal mistake ; recalling to recol- 
lection these old Bible sayings, " The princes of Zoan 
are become fools — the sun is gone down over the pro 
pheXSf and the day is dark unto them." 




WINTER. 

ITH all appliances we find it difficult some- 
times to protect ourselves from the severity of 
winter. As he heaped fuel on the blazing fire, 
or, shaking off the snow at his door, returned to a 
cheerful room and smoking board, what man of feel- 
ing has not exclaimed, Pity the poor in such weather 
as this! As it grows colder, thank God, men's hearts 
grow warmer; and the season that arrests the flow 
of rivers, locking them up in ice, opens the springs 
and swells the stream of charity. Few things, no doubt, 
are more abused, or more open to abuse. And 
when the charities we give to relieve suffering and 
bless innocent and helpless children are wasted on an 
abominable appetite, how doubly accursed of God and 
man does it make that love of drink which hardens the 
hearts of the poor against their offspring, and the hearts 
of the rich against the poor themselves ? The generous 
are afraid to give, lest their bounty should be abused, 
and rather aggravate than alleviate the evils of society. 
That is sad. Yet, when frosts bite keen, and food as 
well as fuel is scarce, the worst, who are never made 



WINTER. 259 

better by neglect, deserve our pity. Base is the selfish- 
ness which at such a time enjoys its comforts, nor has a 
thought to spare for poor old age, with its blood cold 
and thin; for lone and cheerless widowhood; for mothers 
with groups of half-naked children who cower over the 
embers of a dying fire, or lie huddled together, shivering 
and sleepless, beneath a heap of rags. To such it is 
"gloomy winter," and to others also — to the soldier, 
with his bivouac on the blood-stained snow, and the 
piercing cold aggravating his wounds ; to the sailor tossed 
on angry seas, where the sleety shower blots out both 
land and lighthouse, and he hawls with bleeding hands 
on icy ropes to wear his bark off a shore that thunders 
with the roar of breakers ; to the shepherd on the hill, 
battling with the blinding drift, and, type of the great 
Good Shepherd, risking his life for the sheep, — this the 
sad fate he braves — 

" down he sinks 
Beneath the shelter of the shapeless drift, 
Thinking o'er all the bitterness of death ; 
Mixed with the tender anguish nature shoots 
Through the wrung bosom of the dying man ; 
His wife, his children, and his friends, unseen. 
In vain for him the officious wife prepares 
The fire fair-blazing, and the vestment warm ; 
In vain his little children, peeping out 
Into the mingling storm, demand their sire, 
With tears of artless innocence. Alas ! 
Nor wife, nor children, more shall he behold. 
Nor friends, nor sacred hom.e. On every nerve 
The deadly winter seizes ; shuts up sense ; 
And, o'er his inmost vitals cieeping cold, 
Lays him along the snows a stiffened corse, 
Stretched out, and bleaching in the northern tlast* 



a6o WINTER. 

Gloomy to such, in the eyes of happy childhood with 
its holidays, and of youth with its bracing air and healthful 
exercises, and of households with its family reunions, this 
season possesses many charms. Defiant of cold, boyhood 
delights in its blood-stirring games, and nowhere does 
louder, merrier laughter ring than on the sounding ice. 
The day that shortens the hours of labour, lengthens 
those of relaxation and enjoyment. The long evenings, 
the blazing fire, our quiet book, or the cheerful circle of 
a household early home, make us forget, when doors are 
shut and curtains drawn, the desolation without, and 
hear even with feelings of pleasure the howling of the 
storm. What pleasant, happy, merry, thankful meetings 
does it bring round ? Sweeping with blustering winds 
the withered leaves from their parent tree, and asunder 
for ever from each other, it gathers the scattered family 
around the kind old hearth by which the patriarch, 
though the thought of a loved one gone may pass like the 
shadow of a cloud on the scene, sits, happy, venerated, 
and beloved, among his children and children's children, 
— his thin silver locks mingling with the sunny tresses of 
a child who has cHmbed his knee, and, with its arms 
about his neck, clings to the kind old man like a flower- 
ing creeper around a hoary tree. While Spring, Summer, 
and Autumn call to constant labour, Winter, the night 
and sabbath of the year, invites to rest ; and though she 
kills the sweet flowers with nipping frosts, and with 
raging blasts strips forests bare, she increases rather 
than diminishes our social enjoyments — indoor pleasures 
flowing fullest when streams without are ice-bound, and 



WINTER. 261 

the voice of song rising loudest in humble cot and lordly 
hall when tuneful groves and skies are dumb. There- 
fore, instead of coldly welcoming this season, or envying 
the lands that boast perpetual summers, we say with 
Cowper — 

" O Winter ! ruler of the inverted year, 
Thy scattered hair with sleet, Hke ashes, filled ; 
^Thy breath congealed upon thy Hps, thy cheeks 
Fringed with a beard made white with other snows 
Than those of age, thy forehead wrapt in clouds, 
A leafless branch thy sceptre, and thy throne 
A sliding car, indebted to no wheels. 
But urged by storms along its slippery way, 
1 love thee, all unlovely as thou seemest. 
And dreaded as thou art ! " 

We hail the season as one of enjoyments which are 
adapted to our nature, and should awaken gratitude to 
Him from whom all blessings flow. But bring to the 
subject a devout heart, regard it also with the eye of the 
great dramatist, believe with him that there are sermons 
in stones, tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, 
and good in everything ; and Winter, though her fields 
are bare and branches leafless, will yield a crop of profit- 
able and pious thoughts. For example — 

Winie? presents some beautiful and remarkable illustrO' 
tions of God^s wisdom^ power ^ and goodness. 

There is no connection, but the contrary, between 
holiness and ugliness. As is proved by all his works^ 
even the humblest flower and lowest insect — the Divine 
Being has an eye for beauty ; and in imparting the same 
taste to us, God in this, as in other and still hi:^her 



262 WINTER. 

respects, made man after his own image. Now, see 
how He who loves to make his children happy, minis- 
ters to our gratification in the very variety of vestments 
which nature assumes with each changing season. Spring 
comes forth amid a chorus of melodies, apparelled in 
green ; next; Summer comes in flowery robes, gay with 
the brightest colours and perfumed with sweetest odours ; 
then Autumn comes, in sober russet, bending to her 
sickle over the golden com ; and last of all, like a bride 
to the altar, comes Winter in a robe of purest white, all 
hung with sparkling diamonds. When the moon sheds 
her silver light on this snowy mantle, or it lies glistening 
in slanting sunbeams, it looks so pure and bright and 
beautiful as to suggest thoughts of Christ's heavenly 
bride, and the robes they wear who have washed them 
and made them white in the blood of the Lamb. 

Suggestive as this wintry mantle is of such thoughts, 
and beautiful as it looks ere earth has stained its heavenly 
purity, the more closely snow is examined the more will 
all men's wonder and good men's piety grow. Call 
Science, the handmaid of devotion, to our aid ! Let her 
place in the field of a microscope this simple snow-flake, 
which fell lighter than a feather and will melt at a breath, 
and what a galaxy of brilliant crystals ! — forms of beauty 
that breed admiration in the dullest minds, and pouring 
contempt on man's loveliest designs, raise our contempla- 
tions to Him M'ho, out of his treasures, "giveth snow 
like wool; and scattereth the hoarfrost like ashes, and 
casteth out his ice like morsels." 

Teaching us the proper relations of things, God as- 



WINTER. 263 

signs a lower place to beauty than to usefulness. In the 
arrangements of nature, as it should be in ours — in our 
education, our households, our churches and forms of 
worship — the first of these is last, and the last is first ; 
and thus none will be surprised to find, what reason 
should expect and science proves, that God in the snows 
of winter gives the earth a covering not merely orna- 
mental but useful, and even more useful than orncJjnental. 
Strange as the statement may appear to sucJi as are 
accustomed to associate snow only with cold, it afibrds 
a warm covering to the naked fields. Wrapped in snow, 
as an infant in the furs and fleecy coverings a mother's 
care provides, the earth is protected from the severest 
weather ; and, safely sleeping in her warm bosom, thou- 
sands of delicate plants and animals pass the winter, 
ready to come forth at the call of Spring amid the won- 
ders of an annual resurrection. 

'* Th' imprisoned worm is safe 
Beneath the frozen clod ; all seeds of herbs 
Lie covered close. 

I saw the woods and fields at close of day, 
A variegated show ; the meadows green, 
Though faded ; and the lands, where lately waved 
The golden harvest, of a mellow brown, 
Uptm-n'd so lately by the forceful share. 
I saw far off the weedy fallows smile 
With verdure not unprofitable, grazed 
By flocks, fast feeding, and selecting each 
His fav'rite hei-b ; while all the leafless grovei; 
That skirt th' horizon wore a sable hue, 
Scarce noticed in the kindred dusk of eve. 
To-morrow brings a change, a total change! 
Which even now, though silently perform'd, 
Aad slowly, and by most unfeit, the facq 



264 WINTER. 

Of universal nature undergoes. 
Fast falls a fleecy shower : the downy flakes 
Descending, and, with never-ceasing lapse, 
Softly alighting upon all below, 
Assimilate all objects. Earth receives 
Gladly the thick'ning mantle ; and the green 
And tender blade, that feared the chilling blast, 
Escapes unhurt beneath so warm a veil. " 

But these considerations do not exhaust the subject. 
The colour as well as the texture of snow is a witness to 
the wisdom and goodness of God. This covering — no 
shroud that wraps the dead — is white ; and, had God 
pleased, might have been brown, or red, or black, or 
radiant with all the dyes of the rainbow. Yet white is 
chosen — not of caprice, or simply of taste ; but because, 
as experience teaches us and science proves, white vest- 
ments, as they are the coolest in hot, are the warmest in 
cold weather. Can any one reflect on this, and not join 
the Psalmist in exclaiming, " How manifold are thy 
works. Lord God Almighty ! in wisdom hast thou made 
them all ! " . 

But some may object ; saying, that if snow, by its 
colour as well as texture, protects such plants and animals, 
as sleep through winter beneath its covering, it must 
necessarily expose many other creatures to the eyes of 
their enemies ; betraying them, and making them an 
easy prey. The objection is ingenious, but not sound. 
God"s foresight has provided for this. For in those 
northern latitudes where the ground is always for long 
months covered with snow, and even on our own higher 
bills that are often white with drift when the valleys they 



WINTER. 265 

shelter are green, many animals change their dress with 
the season ; and that they may elude the eyes of enemies, 
their coat, whether it be furs or feathers, assumes in 
winter the colour of snow. How manifold are the re- 
sources of God ! — and how may such things suggest this 
thought, if He so cares for his meanest creatures, 
arranging the great laws of nature with the view of 
providing for their safety and ministering to their happi- 
ness, why should they for whom He gave his Son to 
die, distrust his providence or doubt his love — " Are 
not five sparrows," said our Lord, " sold for two farthings, 
and not one of them is forgotten before God? Feai 
not, therefore ; ye are of more value than many spar- 
rows." 

From her snows let us turn to the crystal pavement 
which Winter spreads over rivers, lakes, and even Arctic 
seas, and we shall find in ice a remarkable illustration of 
Divine wisdom, power, and goodness. See yonder crowd 
who pursue their games on the frozen lake j and how 
man, without the power that trod the waves of Galilee, 
walks the water, and, on an element proverbially unstable, 
plants his feet as firmly as on a marble floor ! Familiarity 
with the fact has made us insensible to its wonders ; but 
how great they are, appeared in the incredulity of the 
natives of a tropical land. A missionary had gained on 
their simple hearts ; and, having entire confidence in the 
good man's integrity, king, chiefs, and people were ready 
to embrace the faith. But, alas ! his hopes, like an ill- 
fated bark, were wrecked at the harbour mouth ; and all 
through telling them that in the land where he had left 



266 WINTER. 

father and mother to preach Christ to them, the rivers, 
at certain seasons, became so solid that he had walked 
erect and diy-shot on the surface of their waters. The 
story to their ears had the sound of a he, a manifest lie ; 
and regarding it as an impossibility, and the missionary 
as an impostor, they summarily dismissed him with dis- 
grace. Incredible as it may appear to those who have 
no experience of the fact, water, when its temperature 
falls to thirty-two degrees, passes from the fluid to a solid 
state, and becomes ice. But many who know that, do 
not know that it presents us, in the form of ice, with one 
of the most remarkable proofs of the wisdom and good- 
ness of God. Turned to ice, water is the only substance 
which loses instead of gaining weight on passing from a 
fluid . to a solid state. For instance, solid is specifically 
heavier than fluid gold ; so that were it thrown into a 
crucible of molten gold, it would sink to the bottom ; 
and the same is true of all other metals and substances 
but water. A piece of ice floats on the surface ; plunged 
to the bottom of pool or lake, it rises like a cork to the 
top. The poet says, — 

" God moves in a mysterious way 
His wonders to perform. " 

But here is no unfathomable mystery; for in making 
water an exception to an otherwise universal law, the 
wisdom and goodness of God are plain as sunbeams. 
Consider what had happened if the ice formed on the 
surface of rivers, lakes, and seas, instead of being kept 
by this exceptional law floating on tlie top to be melted 



WINTER. a67 

by sun and winds, had sunk, like other solid things, to 
the bottom. Then each returning winter had added 
another and another layer to this frozen pavement ; and 
as these layers lay sunk in depths beyond the reach of 
spring winds or summer suns, the icy floor, growing 
thicker year by year, had at length risen to the surface : 
and so in time, but long ere now, every dancing river, 
and bright lake, and swelling sea had become a dead, 
dull mass of ice — producing such a degree of cold as to 
create a perpetual winter in all regions of the earth, 
destroy everything that lived, and turn this beautiful 
world into a scene of universal death. Behold the wis- 
dom and goodness which, by making water an exception, 
and the only exception, to an otherwise universal law, 
has averted such a dire catastrophe ! Ice floats on the 
surface of pond and pool, lake and sea, and on that fact 
hangs all life, and the world's old promise, " While the 
earth remaineth, seed time and harvest, and cold and 
heat, and summer and winter, and day and night shall 
not cease." Thus with the ice and snow that quench 
other fires, the child of God may feed those of his devo- 
tion ; and, amid the deep silence of groves where birds 
are mute, and of streams locked fast in ice, and of land- 
scapes muflled in snow, faith hears the voices of angels 
singing, " Holy, holy, holy art thou, Lord God Almighty, 
the whole earth is full of thy glory ! " 

Winter presents an miage of our state by nature. 

In his Song of Songs, Solomon introduces our Lord 
Jesus Christ calling such as He hath redeemed by his 
blood and won by his love from a state of natur<: into 



368 WiNTER. 

one of grace ; and though the winters of Palestine are 
much less severe than ours, he finds in the despoiled and 
ravaged aspect of nature an emblem of the ruin wrought 
by sin. To that divine and gracious call, winter, in the 
aspect in which we are now regarding it, as well as 
spring, lends its poetry, as Christ's heart does its fire. 
" Rise up," he says, " my love, my fair one, and come 
away ; for, lo, the winter is past ; the rain is over and 
gone ; the flowers appear on the earth ; the time of the 
singing of birds is come. Arise, my love, my fair one, 
and come away." 

The further north we travel, as winter grows more 
severe, this figure grows more striking ; nor is any emblem 
of our spiritual condition by nature more appropriate 
than the season when days are short and nights are long, 
and green hills are snow, and streams are ice, and dews 
are hoarfrosts, and leafy branches are naked stems, and 
blooming flowers lie withered, and woods and skies are 
dumb, and the birds which filled them with cheerful 
melodies sit, silent and shivering, on leafless boughs. 
Yet till the Sun of Righteousness arise to enlighten, 
warm, and revive the soul with His beams, there is no 
winter without so dreary as that within us. What ice 
feels so cold, what soil is so frost-bound and barren, as 
an unrenewed heart ? There, grow no fruits of the 
Spirit j there, flow no streams of holy pleasure ; there, 
no peace, soaring upward, sings like a lark in sunny 
skies. Light there is, but how feeble ! — and only such 
as shines in the shortest day when, late to rise and hast- 
ing to set, the wan sun skirts the southern sky. It is 



WINTER. 269 

light without heat ; a knowledge of Divine truth without 
any deep and saving sense of it — a clear head, per- 
haps, but a cold heart ; the form of godliness without its 
power. 

God is love. But the carnal mind, says an Apostle, is 
enmity against God, is not subject to his law, neither 
indeed can be ; nor is it till his Holy Spirit changes our 
hearts, and makes us through faith new creatures in Jesus 
Christ, that " the winter is past, and the time of the sing- 
ing of birds is come." If this divine life is begun, our 
hearts have undergone a change greater and more beauti- 
ful than spring works on the face of nature ; and let joy 
abound ! for surely his peace may flow like a river, whose 
righteousness, in its fresh and pure and full abundance, 
resembles the waves of the sea. Nor does this winter of 
the soul pass away, like that of nature, to be followed by 
spring, that season afterwards by summer, and that again 
by autunm. On the contrary, in holy desires, endeavours, 
and deeds, all the three seasons enter on the stage to- 
gether. And thus to those whom God has brought into 
a state of grace, we may apply the remarkable words of 
Amos, " Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that the 
ploughman shall overtake the reaper, and the treader of 
gTapes him that soweth seed ; and the mountains shall 
drop sweet wine, and all the hills shall melt." Like the 
cedar for strength, and the palm for stateliness, and the 
olive for fmitfulness, a converted man is of all trees most 
like the orange, on whose evergreen boughs fresh buds 
are bursting, and snow-white flowers are blooming, and 
golden fruit is hanging at one and the same time — or, to 



270 WINTER. 

vary the illustration and borrow a figure from Bible story, 
a soul in Christ's hand is like the almond rod in A-'^ron's, 
that at once budded, and blossomed, and brought forth 
fruit. 

" The winter is past ! " — Happy those who can say 
so ! Let them magnify the Lord, though the change is 
but beginning to appear. What, though their praise be 
feeble as the first faltering notes that from a naked tree 
break the winter silence ; what, though the grace of God 
in them is like the gentle flower that springs among 
lingering snows, and lifts a drooping head to frosty skies ? 
These are the welcome heralds of the spring. And those 
Are pledges that He who year by year renews the face of 
vhe earth shall send forth his Spirit, till in the enjoyment 
of hope, and peace, and liberty, and purity, we can say 
*' The winter is past ; " and, in the exercise of faith, can 
welcome Death himself, and recognise in his dreaded 
summons the voice of our beloved, saying, " Arise, my 
love, my fair one, and come away ! " 

Winter presents aji image of a state of grace. 

Excepting, perhaps, the dark spot in the bloom of the 
bean, there is nothing in nature perfectly black — neither 
the sable's fur, nor the raven's wing, nor the glossy tresses 
of the Indian maid, nor the dark man's lustrous eyes. 
Even so among the most wicked men, none are found 
perfectly bad. The worst can be worse ; and shall be, 
since the guilt of the impenitent will increase with their 
years, and go on darkening, deepening through an eter- 
nity of sin and suffering. But in snow, as it falls m 
4owny flakes from hea,ven, or lies far removed from thj3 



WINTER. 271 



smoke of cities and the dust of fields and roads, in the 
bosom of the Alps, or on the sides of their silver horns, 
nature presents us with an object of perfect purity. 
Dazzlingly white, the fairest skin or finest fabric looks 
dull, if not foul, beside it. Here is a beautiful, perfect 
emblem of Christ's righteousness — robed in which, " God 
sees no iniquity in Jacob, and no perverseness in Israel." 
What so fit to represent the righteousness that cost our 
Lord his life, and is the price of ours, as this snowy, 
stainless mantle ? God himself turns the sinner's eye 
on it, and forbids him to despair. By the cross of his 
beloved Son, by the fountain of redeeming blood, by the 
laver of Divine regeneration, He addresses the despon- 
dent and despairing, saying, ** Come now, and let us 
reason together : though thy sins be as scarlet, they shall 
be white as snow." 

Nor is it only the pure, perfect, stainless, and law- 
fulfilling character of redeeming righteousness which snow 
suggests to a devout and thoughtful eye. How full in 
their abundance, how free in their distribution, are these 
treasures of tbs sky 3 — covering alike lowly cottages 3j>^. 
royal paiaces, the poor man's garden and the rich man^s 
lands, tiny molehill and towering mountain. By many 
images peculiar to their own country, the sacred writers 
laboured to set forth the fulness and freeness of Divine 
mercy ; but the stores of nature supplied them, perhaps, 
with none so appropriate as those feathery flakes that 
fill the whole expanse of heaven, and, wheeling down in 
countless myriads, cover all the landscape ; casting over 
'Jj*» impurities of town and country, of roads and fields, 



aiyi WINTER. 

of farais and graveyards, a veil of stainless snow. W 
this is an image of the mercy of God, why should any 
perish ? — who is there who would not be saved would 
they only spread out their guilty souls in penitence, anil 
faith, and prayer? Change as great should be wrought 
on them as a winter night works, silent and noiseless, on 
the face of the earth. No lightning flashed through the 
darkness, no storm howled, no thunder peals woke the 
lightest sleeper ; yet, typifying the advent of a kingdom 
which, often at least, " comes not with observation," on 
opening our shutters in the morning, the eye, as far as it 
can reach, sees gardens, houses, fields, winding river, 
and glassy lake, — the whole landscape, onward to the 
swelling hills upon its verge, robed in one broad mantle 
of heavenly beauty and spotless purity. So in God's 
sight appear the heart, and life, and character of all who, 
abandoning every hope of salvation by works, receive 
the righteousness which is not of works, but of faith. 
Polluted and foul by nature as others, all believers have 
put on Christ. They have washed their robes and made 
them white in the blood of the Lamb ; and, still engaged 
in the work of sanctification, they are not idle but dili- 
gent, not careless but prayerful, to "be found of Him in 
peace, without spot, and blameless." 




AUTUMN. 

is pleasant to leave the hot, hard pavements of 

a city for the meadow's cool green sward; pent- 
up streets for a spacious but sequestered valley ; 
dull walls of brick or stone for the height and majesty of 
mountains :hat dip their feet in the lake, and raise their 
heads to tl\e clouds ; the roar of carriages and din of 
crowds for a quiet scene, whose only sounds are those of 
bleating sheep and lowing cattle, the murmur of a stream 
or dash of tiny waves on the shelving shore, the shouts 
of happy reapers where the com falls to their sickles, 
or is borne off to threshing-floors. Every man of taste 
enjoys the beauties of such a scene ; and a man of devout, 
habitual piety sees God as plainly mirrored there, as are 
the flowers, trees, rocks, and hills in the glassy surface of 
its lake. 

Such appear to have been the circumstances of David, 
when in the 65th Psalm he composed that magnificent 
ode, — grand song for a Harvest Home, — where he adores 
God in nature and soars on the wings of inspiration to 
the height of his argument. No doubt descriptions of 



274 AUTUMN. 

country scenes, glowing with the rich colours of Them- 
son or Goldsmith, have been penned in city garjsts. 
But while their authors, drawing on imagination, saV no 
more of green things and nature than some poor rose, 
or dusty plant of thyme that stood on the vnndcw-sill, 
thirsting for a shower and drooping for lack of suxshine, 
that Psalm has the freshness of painting where the 
artist, carrying palette and canvas to the oper fields, 
copies direct from nature. The very mountain? appear 
to have been towering before David, of whicli, singing 
God's praise, he says, ''Which by His strength setteth 
fast the mountains ; " overhead, the clouds, heaven's 
treasuries of rain, floated in the blue air, and below, 
winding along, went the river that sparkled in the sun, 
and, conducted by a thousand conduits, gave fertility to 
the soil, of which he said, " Thou visitest the earth, and 
waterest it : Thou greatly enrichest it with the river of 
God : Thou makest it soft with showers : Thou blessest 
the springing thereof;" and when, still rising from nature 
up to nature's God, he sung, " Thou crownest the year 
with Thy goodness; and Thy paths drop fatness; the 
pastures are clothed with flocks, the valleys also are 
covered over with corn ; they shout for joy, they als.:D 
sing," one cannot but feel that the scene was befors 
him — hills dotted with snowy fleeces, and an umbra- 
geous valley, where crowded reapers, to shouts, and 
song, and merry laughter, made wide gaps in the 
golden com. The scenes of autumn raised David's 
mind to God. And well they may ours ; for in medi- 
tating on this period of the year,! may remark, that — 



AUTUMN. 27s 

Autumn is the seasoi in which God is eminently y or 
rather pre-eminently visible. 

It is a remarkable fact, that, notwithstanding the pro- 
gress of arts and science, and the vast number of useful 
as well as brilliant discoveries man has made during the 
last four thousand years, he has not added so much as 
one new grain to those he cultivates for food. Sculp- 
tured monuments, as old as, if not older than, the days 
of Joseph, show that wheat, barley, and our other grains, 
were well known to the Egyptians; as well known in 
the early ages of the world as in this. Another, and a 
no less remarkable fact is this, that the cereal grasses — ^by 
which we mean those plants that yield wheat, barley, 
and such other grains — are nowhere, on the face of all 
the earth, found growing wild. Apparently unable to 
live by self-sowing, they have totally disappeared from 
every country which man, abandoning, has left to its 
own resources — flowers, forests, fruit-trees, roofless cities 
and ruined temples remain, but no stalks of com, to tell 
that he once was there. If they cannot live now, it 
seems fair to conclude, that these plants never did live 
without his culture ; and that the knowledge of their 
uses and of their modes of cultivation be owed to the 
direct instruction of Him, his teacher in this as in many 
things else, who, to quote the words of Scripture, " took 
the man, and put him in the garden of Fden to dress 
and keep it." 

These facts suggest such an intercourse be' ween man 
and his Maker as corresponds with Scripture, ativi those 
hints it gives of the intimate and happy communion- ^-^ 



276 AUTUMN. 

which they lived, till man fell and sin estranged them. 
Ignorant of these things, and, at least to appearance, 
altogether ignoring Divine Providence, one of our poets 
ascribes the bounties of harvest to human industry alone, 
and, thrusting God entirely out of view, sings : — 

Attempered sun arise, 

Sweet beamed, and shedding oft through lucid clouds 

A pleasing calm ; while broad and brown below 

Extensive harvests hang the heavy head, 

* * * * « • 

Far as the circling eye can shoot around 
Unbounded tossing in a flood of com. 
These are thy blessings, Industry ! rough power ! 
Whom labour still attends, and sweat, and pain. 
Raiser of human kind ! by nature cast, 
Naked and helpless, out amid the woods 
And wilds, to rude inclement elements ; 
With various seeds of art deep in the mind 
Implanted, and profusely poured around 
Materials infinite, but idle all, 
Still unexerted, in the xmconscious breast, 
Slept the lethargic powers ; Corruption still 
Voracious, swallowed what the liberal hand 
Of Bounty scattered o'er the savage year ; 
And still the sad barbarian, roving, mixed 
, With beasts of prey ; or for his acorn meal 

Fought the fierce tusky boar ; a shivering wretch I 
* * * till Industry approached 

And roused him from his miserable sloth : 
His faculties unfolded ; pointed out 
Where lavish nature the directing hand 
Of art demanded. 

Giving all the honour to human industry and its 
triumphs which is due, the heathen themselves teach 
us to bring a higher actor than man upon the scene. 
They recognised their dependence for the bounties of 



AUTUldN. 277 

harvest on the will and providence of God — by this 
grand truth redeeming from childishness some of their 
wildest legends, and softening to some extent the savage 
features of customs from which humanity revolts. A 
tribe in our Indian Empire, for example, never sowed 
their fields till they had first taken steps to propitiate 
their god. These, as was related to me by an ofiicer 
who had had charge of their district, consisted of a 
human sacrifice, offered up in the person of a prisoner of 
war, around whom the peasants stood grimly, knife in 
hand, each ready, so soon as the fatal blow was struck, 
to rush in on the victim, slice a piece of flesh from the 
bleeding corpse, and, hastening with it to his fields, 
sprinkle them with the dripping gore. Neither the pity 
with which, spectators of such a murderous scene, we 
should have looked on the trembling victim, nor the 
horror with which we would have turned our eyes from 
such savage rites, could blind them to the fact, that these 
heathen, however culpable and revolting their mode of 
expressing it, owned a power superior to human industry, 
and in the harvests of their fruitful fields, saw God, to 
use the words of David, " crowning the year with His 
goodness." 

The Greeks attributed man's first knowledge of the 
arts of agriculture to other than his own genius. They 
regarded them as a revelation, not a discovery; and 
ascribed them directly to Divine instruction. According 
to their mythology, Ceres, the goddess of com and 
harvests, who gives her name to that family of plants 
which, called cereal grasses^ yield wheat, barley, and 



278 AUTUMN. 



such Other grains, first taught a native of Attica the 
art of husbandry. She showed him how to plough the 
ground ; how to sow and reap corn ; how to make 
bread, and cultivate fruit-trees. Nor did the benignant 
divinity stop there. Reminding us of the true story that 
relates how Jesus sent His disciples forth to carry the 
tidings of salvation to a perishing world, the legend, 
rising to worthy ideas of what a God should be and do, 
relates that Ceres, having presented her own chariot to 
her disciple, commanded him to take farewell of his 
native land, and travel all over the earth to communicate 
the arts of agriculture to its rude inhabitants — who had 
till then subsisted on nothing better than roots and 
acorns. 

We find a nation more ancient than the Greeks who 
also regarded agriculture as a Divine gift, and recognised 
in the fruits of harvest more than the industry of man ; 
even the providence and power of God. These were 
the Egyptians. According to them, it was Isis, one of 
their most celebrated deities, who, on being changed 
into a cow and afterwards restored to the human form, 
communicated to their ancestors man's earliest know- 
ledge of the arts of husbandry. In acknowledgment of 
the gift and in honour of the giver, they worshipped her 
under the form of a woman, holding a globe in her 
hands, and also a vessel filled with ears of corn. Nor 
did they consider themselves indebted to Isis for the 
knowledge of agriculture only ; but plainly, though in a 
wild and weird legend, attributed to her benignant influ- 
ence the bounties of every harvest. In Egypt, as is well 



AUTUMN. 279 



known, these depend on the overflowings of the Nile ; 
and. as the story ran, it was to the tears she shed over 
the body of Osiris, her murdered brother, that the 
country owed those annual inundations which imparted 
such fertility to the soil of Egypt as made it the granary 
of the world. 

In these old legends, who may not recognise traditions 
— though changed and distorted — of those early days 
when man had God for his teacher, and Eden for his 
home — a proof and illustration of our statement that in 
autumn, with its ripened fruits and golden hai-vests, the 
power and providence of God are pre-eminently con 
spicuous ? Not that the other seasons do not also pro- 
claim His glory. They do, were it by nothing else than 
their regular succession. It was reckoned a great triumph 
of human art when they constructed a chronometer in 
London, which formed perhaps man's nearest approach 
in mechanism to the perfection of the works of God — a 
time-piece which, after being carried round the globe, 
was found on the ship's return to have deviated from 
true time by two secoiids only in the course of a whole 
year. But the seasons are regulated by a clock which, 
placed in the heavens, has gone on without mending or 
winding, not for one year, nor a hundred, nor a thousand, 
but many thousand years with undeviating regularity. 
How manifold are Thy works. Lord God Almighty ; in 
wisdom hast Thou made them all ! In their unfailing 
succession how do the seasons display Thy providence, 
and illustrate Thy promise, given beneath the rainbow, 
by a mountain altar and beside the stranded ark, " While 



2S0 AUTUMN. 

the earth remaineth seed-time and harvest, and cold and 
heat, and summer and winter, and day and night, shall 
not cease." 

Whethei the phenomena be those of winter, when 
streams lie locked in ice, and the earth looks dead, 
wrapped in a shroud of snow ; or of spring, at whose call 
nature undergoes an annual resurrection, and leaves her 
grave in the bloom of a perpetual youth ; or of summer, 
gay with flowers ; or of autumn, crowned with ears of 
nodding com, " all Thy works praise Thee, O God, and 
show forth Thy glory." And, thanks to science, each 
new discovery in the realms of nature but confirms our 
faith in the Word of God ; and, like the steps of one 
who climbs a mountain, enlarges our views of the good- 
ness, wisdom, and power of Him who is the Maker and 
Monarch of all. Yet autumn is the only one of the 
seasons when the Church, in days of thanksgiving, calls 
her members specially to own and praise the goodness of 
God. And why but because it is specially conspicuous 
when in bountiful harvests He crowns the year with His 
goodness, and supplies those who seek daily bread with 
a twelvemonth's store — in overflowing bams and swelling 
stack-yards, with food fcr a whole year to come ? 

Autumn crowns the other seasons. It shows God's 
work complete and finished, and therefore glorifies Him 
most — the other seasons being but preparatory steps to 
this. Winter prepares the bed for the seed ; its pause 
resting, its snows and rains watering, and its swelling 
frosts breaking up the soil. Spring, with soft and warm 
breath wakens the vitality of the buried grain ; firom its 



AUTUMN. 281 

dry and husky form evoking a green tiny blade. With 
her showers of light and heat, with cooling rain and 
burning sunshine, summer nourishes the tender plant, 
developing the flowers that are the parents of the precious 
fruit. Lord of the year, these " cast up " the way for the 
approach of autumn, and so the poet of the " Seasons " 
sings — 

Crowned with the sickle and the wheaten sheaf, 
While Autumn, nodding o'er the yellow plain, 
Conies jovial on ; the Doric reed once more, 
Well pleased, I tune. Whate'er the wintiy frost 
Nitrous prepared ; the various blossom'd spring, 
Put in white promise forth ; and summer suns 
Concocted strong, rush boundless now to view, 
Full, perfect all, and swell my glorious theme. 

Stop in midsummer, and the seasons and labour thaf 
preceded is labour lost, — it were the springing of an arck 
without its key-stone, or the walls of a house withouf 
roof and coping. It is when fields, once white with 
winter snow, once green with reedy leaves, once waving 
in the wind with upright heads and empty ears, grow 
golden, fall to bands of joyous reapers, are borne from 
the rough stubble to full barn-yards and busy mills, it is 
then that God comes forth from the clouds and darkness 
around His throne, the Father and Friend of all — crowd- 
ing the year with His goodness, and giving bread to both 
His praying and prayerless creatures. We crown autumn 
with ears of corn ; and she, as the Jews did with their 
first fruits, carries her golden treasures to the Temple 
and lays them on the altar of her God. She crowns Him 
with her honours ; to Him, as naving blessed the labours 



282 AUTUMN. 



of the husbandman, and guided the secret processes of 
nature, and directed the procession of revolving seasons, 
and distributed the proportions of shower and sunshine, 
ascribing the glory and praise that are due. 

Autumn is a joyous season. 

The harvest was particularly so in old times, especially 
in that happy land where God, their lawgiver, directed 
the Israelites both how to cultivate, and how to reap the 
ground. " Thou shalt not sow thy field," He said, " with 
mingled seed ; thou shalt not plow with an ox and an ass 
together." In Italy I have often seen an ox and an ass 
in the same yoke; nor do these injunctions forbid it. 
Made for the Jews, to whose circumstances they were 
adapted, and whom they were intended to warn against 
intercourse, and especially intermarriages, with the sur- 
rounding heathen, their authority has passed away ; but 
not so, at least in spirit, those harvest laws which God 
enjoined on Israel. What benevolence breathes, what 
grand lessons of humanity are embodied, in the following 
rules : — " When ye reap the harvest of your land, thou 
shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither 
shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest . . . 
thou shalt leave them for the poor and stranger . . . 
When thou cuttest down thine harvest in thy field, and 
hast forgot a sheaf in the field, thou shalt not go again 
to fetch it : it shall be for the stranger, for the fatherless, 
and for the widow. When thou beatest thine olive tree, 
thou shalt not go over the boughs again, it shall be for 
the stranger, for the fatherless, and for the widow. When 
thou gatherest the grapes of thy vineyard, thou shalt not 



AUTUMN. 183 

glean it afterward : it shall be for the stranger, for the 
fatherless, and for the widow. And thou shalt remember 
that thou wast a bondman in the land of Egypt : there- 
fore I command thee to do this thing." 

The result of laws so well adapted to foster the spirit 
of humanity, we see in that charming picture of a harvest- 
field which adorns the pages of the Book of Ruth. There, 
save where stiff old age or tender childhood seek to earn 
a little wage, the reapers, fair women and stalwart youths, 
a blithe and merry band, go down in steady line on the 
ranks of the standing com. Behind them, scattered over 
the stubble, where some bend beneath the weight of years, 
and others are busier with play than work, come old men 
and women, widows, and orphan children, gleaning the 
stray stalks, left for them and the birds of heaven, grow- 
ing into a sheaf of com which, borne on their heads, they 
carry home at nightfall to grind in the household mill, to 
eat and be satisfied, and praise Him, who, kind guardian 
of the poor, said to the husbandman, " Thou shalt not 
gather the gleanings of thy harvest." Well, one day on 
the uplands of Bethlehem, the sun is shining bright, and 
with song and challenge and merry laughter the reapers 
ply their flashing sickles amid the corn, when the master 
appears on the scene. A kind man is Boaz, and pious as 
kind. " The Lord be with you," is his " good morning " 
to his servants, — the familiar but devout wish he offers. 
Suspending work and song to do him reverence, they in 
turn illustrate a rule that may be as well expressed by 
the words, " such master, such servants," as by those in 
more common use, " such priest, such people," — " The 



284 AVTUMN. 



Lord bless thee," is their respectful, kind, and devout 
response. And now, not deeming the poor beneath his 
notice, the good man turns from the reapers to the 
gleaners, and among these pensioners of God's bounty 
and his own, his eye lights on a widow, young in years 
but of modest mien. Poorly clad and of a sad counte- 
nance, early acquainted with sorrow, a widow, friendless, 
a stranger in a strange land, the gentle Ruth appeals to 
the kindliest feelings of a noble heart. Nor in vain. 
Her whom ruthless villany would have marked down for 
its prey, he commends to the care of virtuous maidens, 
and with a delicate attention to the feelings of the poor, 
worthy as well of our imitation as of our praise, he whis- 
pers to the reapers, " Let fall some handfuls of purpose 
for her, and leave them that she may glean them." 
Beautiful picture ! one we love to dwell on. 

Our modern system of husbandry has blotted all this 
out. We have bigger stacks; we make more money; 
but it may be a question whether the country has not 
lost more morally than it has gained materially by the 
change — lost more in the dying out of these old kindly 
customs than gained in the greater produce of the soil. 
Nor is it possible to look on this picture of an old 
harvest-field, lighted up with the sunshine of human 
kindness, without some feeling of regret that such scenes 
belong to the past, and, only found now in books and 
picture-galleries, are numbered with the things that were. 

Still, with its harvests and the bounties of the year, 
autumn is a gladsome season. One is glad of it for the 
sake of the very birds, the sweet choristers of bush and 



AUTUMN. 285 

field, and many other creatures else. They rejoice and 
revel in its profusion ; and, storing up its bounties in 
hollow tree or homes beneath the ground, are provisioned 
against the storms of winter. How dead his soul in 
whom it awakens no feelings of gladness and gratitude 
to see, in fields where the sheaves stand thick and tall, 
plenty for man and beast ; ground to hope that the poor 
of the land shall eat and be satisfied, and praise the 
name of the Lord their God. 

Its very labours present a cheerful aspect. What 
sights so pleasant as those it offers ? What toil where 
the sweat in which man eats his bread wears less the 
aspect of a curse ? The blue sky flecked with snowy 
clouds, the neighbouring wood, where some late songster 
peals out her music, tinted with the colours of the rain- 
bow, the long stretches of golden com that bespeak food 
and plenty, the healthful breeze wantoning with the 
ruddy cheek and dishevelled hair of youthful reapers, 
the bright flashes of the sickle, the brighter flashes of 
happy faces, the merry laughter of light hearts, the 
robust health that makes a play of work, how pleasant 
the spectacle ! How different the sunless room in the 
crowded city, where the workman sits, pale and lone- 
some, breathing a stifling atmosphere ; or the tall mill, 
where wan and ill-developed forms stand amid ceaseless 
whirr and dust, watching from early morn to night the 
threads and flying spindles ; or the forge where, begrimed 
with smoke and stunned with din, half-naked men swing 
ihe heavy hammer and blow the roaring fire ; or the 
dripping pit, where the grim miner, leaving the sun and! 



286 AUTUMN. 



green fields, descends to pass his days in the regions of 
perpetual night, perilling life for the treasures the earth 
hides in her bowels. What greater contrast than a pale,, 
sickly needlewoman, toiling with thin fingers by the night 
lamp at her weary task in city garret or hot, crowded,, 
stifling workshop, and yonder rustic maid with form to 
which health and out-door labour lend grace, mirth 
sparkling in her eyes, on her cheek roses that shine 
through the tan, in one hand a reaper's sickle, and in 
the other the nodding heads of com. Alas ! that in 
many country districts their moral should correspond 
so ill with their material aspects ! It is sad to think 
that beneath those charming scenes of rural beauty that 
culminate in the happy spectacle of a harvest-field, there 
lies a coarseness of manners and licentiousness of con- 
duct that makes the innocence of country life, as con- 
trasted with that of town life, an utter dream. The 
habits of the peasantry in some quarters are little higher 
than those of the cattle they tend — a sad and shameful 
fact ; one which calls aloud for a remedy on the part of 
the ministers, parents, and masters of this Christian and 
Protestant land. 

But to return to the gladsome and joyful aspects of 
this season. What a pleasant sight, when winds have 
winnowed the standing sheaves, to see the loaded cart 
rocking over the furrowed fields; grey-haired peasants 
who, bent and done with labour, are themselves ready to 
fall like a shock of corn in its season, leaning on their 
staves, and mothers with smiling infants in their arms, 
turning out of doors to see the last loa.d borne home 



AUTUMN. a87 



amid the shouts of brawny men, and smiles of maidens, 
and shrill cheers of troops of boys and girls, who, '.nfected 
with the general happiness, swell the procession, and 
cheer — they know not why. And when early snows 
powder the hill-tops, and russet leaves fly whirhng through 
the air and sweep along the road, how pleasant in pass- 
ing the snug farmstead amid these tokens of coming 
winter, to see the bounties of Providence stored under 
roof and thatch, safe from frosts and storm. The pre- 
cious fruits of the earth safely lodged, let Harvest Home 
be celebrated. But with cheerfulness, let grateful thanks 
be given to Him who blessed the hands of labour, and 
whose paths, as He held the winds in His fist, and 
measured out due proportions of shower and sunshine, 
dropped fatness on fields that had otherwise been scorched 
with heat or drowned with rain. Where or at what other 
time are thoughtless folly and wild riot more reprehen- 
sible ? Let people be happy by all means, but holy 
also ; celebrating harvest homes in the spirit of the law 
which required the Jews to carry the first cut sheaf of 
com to the house, and lay it, a pious offering, on the 
altar of God. The beastly riot, the drunkenness, and 
wild excesses of other days are happily disappearing from 
ours. May they everywhere, and soon, give place to the 
practice, — to her honour first begun in England, — where, 
with an ample feast and pleasant hours for all who shared 
in harvest labour, the fete is opened by an act of wor- 
ship ; and voices that rung with merry laughter amid 
the falling com, and shouted as the last waggon swimg 
in at the gate with its golden load, sweetly mingle in 



288 AUTUMN. 



praise to Him to whose mercy we owe alike the bread 
that perisheth, and what never perisheth — Jesus, the 
bread of Ufe. 

Autumn is a solemn season. 

Like a fine piece of music which now sinks into dying 
strains and now swells into a flood of melody, with pas- 
sages both grave and gay, this season presents varied 
features — combining deeply solemn with bright and cheer- 
ful aspects. Now the mornings are cool and bracing, 
the days are clear, and the nights, lighted up by a full 
harvest moon, shine with unusual splendour ; and if 
flowers, lingering only in gardens, and tempting the bee 
in the uplands where heather robes the hills in purple, 
have vanished from field and moor and meadow, the 
loss is largely compensated. In place of one uniform, 
sober robe of green, dulled by summer dust and heat, 
the woods assume the gayest garb, and glow with such 
bright and varied hues as sets at nought the pride of 
dress, and highest arts of painters. The tints of autumn 
impart such beauty to the earth as glowing sunsets to 
the sky. Yet, as in that lovely victim of a fell disease, 
who sits cushioned in a sick-chamber, with hands white 
as the snowy pillows that support her form, and eyes 
that shine with a strange, unusual lustre, and cheeks 
tinted like a delicate rose, the beauties of autumn are 
those of decay : and he who can hold converse with 
nature may, as if there were "tongues in trees," hear 
this solemn voice sounding forth on the ears of a heed- 
less world, " We all do fade as a leaf" In these dying 
leaves, man beholds the affecting emblems of himsel£ 



AUTUMN. 289 

Beautiful, but solemn sight, they teach us that by-andby 
this life and world shall know us no more than the trees 
shall know them. 

Autumn-leaves fade to fall. The connection between 
their fragile forms and the stem grows weak, the flow of 
sap stagnates, and at length ceases — and they die ; and 
now a wind, the howling herald of winter, strikes the 
tree and strips it naked. Flying leaves fill the troubled 
air, go whirling along the ground, and, swept from their 
parent stem to be scattered far and wide, present a sight 
that suggests sad thoughts to thoughtful minds — how 
sin has broken the holy ties which united us to God ; 
how sinners are hurried away and along by the 
power of temptation ; in the case of the best, how true 
the words, "Our iniquities like the wind have carried 
us away." 

Here, thank God, the emblem ceases. Swept away 
by the gale, tossed by eddies into rotten heaps, left on 
roads to be trodden under foot and mingled with the 
mire, or dropped into brawling streams that convey 
them, madly dancing, to the river which flings its wreck 
ashore or floats them out to sea, they return no more to 
the parent from whose arms they were torn. But the 
ravages of sin are not irremediable. Whom it has car- 
ried away from God, Jesus has come to restore, and by 
faith in his blood restores, — '• Hearken unto me, ye 
stout-hearted, that are far from righteousness, I bring 
near my righteousness." " Return, ye backsliding child- 
ren, and I will h-eal your backsHdings." And such power 
does the grace of God impart to believers, that, though 

u 



290 AUTUMN. 

once like withered leaves, which winds whirl into the 
air, roll along the road, and seizing, fling into flood or 
fire, they now withstand temptations, — as a crag the 
roaring blast, or a tree with roots rifted in the solid 
rock, the tempest that may shake, but cannot remove 
it — " They that trust in the Lord, shall be as Mount 
Zion, which cannot be moved." 

While her forests with their sere and yellow leaves 
warn us of our own decay and death, the fields of 
autumn recall to thoughtful minds truths yet more 
solemn. These fields give as they get. This abundant 
crop, and that scanty one, teach us, that they who in 
prayers, sacrifices, and labours for the cause of God, sow 
sparingly, shall reap also sparingly, but that they, on the 
other hand, who sow bountifully, shall reap also bounti- 
fliUy — learning in heaven, if not on earth, that God loveth 
a large and cheerful giver. 

Moreover, what husbandman ever reaped wheat from 
acres he sowed with barley ? Be the season favourable 
or adverse, be the soil the richest loam or hungry moor- 
land, as was the kind of seed sown in spring, so is the 
kind of harvest reaped in autumn. Even so, as in those 
fields where the same grain falls to the reaper's sickle 
that fell from the sower's hand, as man soweth in his 
life he shall reap at his death ; " Be not deceived," says 
Paul, " God is not mocked ; whatsoever a man sowetli, 
that shall he also reap ; for he that soweth to the flesh 
[indulges in the lusts of the flesh] shall of the flesh reap 
corruption [the miseries of hell] ; but he that soweth to 
the Spirit, sJiall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." 



AUTUMN, 291 



Moreover, the season which reminds us of these truths 
reminds us of the grand occasion when they shall be 
realised — to the everlasting joy of some, and the ever- 
lasting sorrow of others. Around us the emblems of our 
death hang in the tinted foliage, and lie at our feet in 
withered leaves ; above us, the sun, as if himself decay- 
ing and wan with age, sheds a fainter light, communi- 
cates a feebler warmth, and, like man in the evening of 
life, goes earHer to bed, and is later to rise ! but before 
us the field with its crowd of reapers, and flashing sickles, 
and falling com — to be borne off, the grain to the garner, 
the chaff to the fire — suggests something yet more solemn 
— the most solemn scene of which this world shall be the 
theatre ; the last great assize : all Adam's family met face 
to face for the first and the last time, in one vast as- 
sembly ; the God of Glory descending to judgment ; the 
great white throne filled by the august person of His 
Son j the crowd of angels, ministers to do his will, and 
give, in the curse executed on one class and the crowns 
conferred on another, to every man according to his 
deeds, entering the vast, awed, agitated, solemn multi- 
tude to part it into two great divisions; to call those 
who have accepted Christ to glory, and consign such as 
have unhappily rejected Him to inexpressible and end- 
less woe. Giving a grandeur and solemnity to the scene 
which, though unheeded, perhaps, either by the farmer 
who is thinking only of his profits or the reapers who are 
thinking only of their gains, belongs to none other scene 
on earth, — ^Jesus said, " The harvest is the end of the 
world; and the reapers are the angels. As therefore 

u 2 



292 AUTUMN. 



the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it 
be in the end of this world. The Son of Man shall send 
forth His angels, and they shall gather out of His king 
dom all things that offend, and them which do iniquity, 
and shall cast them into a furnace of fire : there shall be 
wailing and gnashing of teeth. Then shall the righteous 
shine forth as the sun in the kingdom of their Father. 
Who hath ears to hear, let him hear." Yes : let us hear ; 
heed the warning ; seek and embrace the Saviour ; and 
in making our calling and election sure, work while it is 
called to-day, lest we should have to bemoan our folly, 
and cry, as we look back with unavailing regrets on the 
past, and forward with shrinking dread on the future, 
" The harvest is past, the summer is endld, and 
we are not saved p 




THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND 
PRAYER. 

N the month of August, 1845, I was spending a 
few days in an old mansion house on the 
shores of the Moray Firth. The oak-panelled 
walls of the dining-room were hung with pictures of the 
ancestors of my host, some of whom had played no in- 
conspicuous part in the olden time. The sheen of their 
breastplates, and their serious, determined air, comported 
well with their history. Right or wrong, they had, with 
others of the nobility and gentry, espoused the cause of 
the Covenant ; but unlike many who, turning back, 
proved a deceitful bow in the day of battle, they stuck 
true to the " blue banner ; " fighting, suffering for it, and 
earning the respect which courage and consistency seldom 
fail to secure. 

Thinking, by way of contrast, of the happy days in 
which we live — tolerating differences, and granting to 
others the liberty we claim for ourselves — and how 
quietly that old mansion, once flashing with the fires and 
wrapt in the smoke of musketry, now stood among iti 



294 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

venerable ash-trees and elms, I stepped out from their 
shade, one fine morning, to see the plenty as well as 
enjoy the peace that blessed our favoured land. There 
it lay all around, in hedged and well-cultivated fields, 
whicii, ripening under God's showers and sunshine, and 
growing white unto the harvest, promised abundance 
both for man and beast. But what is this ? Yesterday 
there were broad acres of potato there, with stems erect, 
leaves of healthy green, and the shaws, as they are called 
in Scotland, so luxuriant that it was not possible to dis- 
tinguish one drill from another. Changed in one short 
night, this field is now, so to speak, but the corpse of 
what it had been. No longer one broad flush of green, 
every separate furrow is visible, and each plant stands 
with head drooping to the ground, its stems bent under 
the weight of leaves that, withered, blighted, blackened, 
impart to the scene a melancholy aspect, and to the air a 
strangely foetid odour. While I, who had been a country 
clergyman, and was more or less experienced in agricul- 
ture, stooa wondering at a phenomenon which I found 
myself utterly unable to explain, the tenant of the farm 
came up j and him I found as much amazed, and, as was 
natural in his circumstances, more distressed at the sight 
than myself. A grey-haired man, he had never seen the 
like before. 

In the days of those Covenanters whose mailed and 
sombre figures gave an antique and martial aspect to the 
oak panels of the old mansion, some would have found 
a ready explanation of this calamity in " the evil eye," 
the curse or cantrips of a malicious witch. But in the 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 295 

northern part of the island " the schoolmaster had been 
abroad " for more than a century ; wolves and witches 
had both disappeared together — the burning of the last 
witch and the killing of the last wolf having occurred 
much about the same time ; and so the farmer, though 
greatly puzzled, sought for an explanation of the matter 
in other than preternatural causes. " It beats a', sir," he 
said ; *' it dings my judgment a'thegither. I'm thinking, 
though it never waukened me wi' its roarin', that there 
has been an awfu' wind in the nicht, tossing and dashing 
the shaws thegither ; and that that accounts for sic a 
bonny field, as this was yesterday, being as ye see it 
now, the shaws a' wallowed, and the leaves growin' a* 
black." 

This theory might be ingenious, but it could not be 
true ; since, had such a hurricane as it supposed struck 
the turrets of the old mansion house, howling in the 
chimneys and roaring amid the trees around, it must 
certainly have wakened us, and sounder sleepers too. 
So, dissatisfied with the explanation, I returned to men- 
tion the circumstance to my host at the breakfast-table, 
and discuss its probable causes; and how was our 
wonder increased on learning from the newspapers the 
day thereafter, that that same night, perhaps in the same 
hour, perhaps at the same moment, the potato-fields of 
the whole country, had been struck — north, south, east, 
and west. It was, in fact, what we afterwards became 
too familiar with — the potato disease ; a severe pestilence 
of its kind, and one on which gaunt famine followed, 
thouo-h not marching with its strides — in Irelac 1 c';.e- 



396 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

daily, emptying her cabins, and fjiling her churchyards. 
The country did not sit down supinely under this cala- 
mity. AVhile much was done to alleviate the sufferings 
it entailed — Parliament voting the ten millions sterling 
for that purpose — every effort was made to discover the 
nature of the disease ; its causes, and its cure. Farmers 
tried all manner of experiments, even bringing the potato 
in its native state from its birthplace on the slopes of 
Chili and Peru ; the Government instituted all manner 
of inquiries ; and philosophers turned all the lights of 
science on the mystery. The country was as wise at the 
end of the day as at the beginning. These black spots 
on the green leaf, these black spots in the root ; how the 
disease came, and how it went ; how it was generated 
and how propagated ; what might prevent, or arrest, or, 
if anything could do so, cure it, were subjects that 
baffled man's utmost skill. God left us to be baffled and 
beaten, to feel ourselves as powerless and helpless as a 
straw borne on the bosom of a stream. But when He 
had taught us to bow reverently and humbly beneath His 
hand, and to feel that we were in it for good or evil. He 
was pleased to take it off. The pest was arrested, though 
enough of it remains to remind us of our dependence on 
God : departing as mysteriously as it came, through no 
efforts on our part, nor power or will but His who says to 
the sea, " Hither shalt thou come and no further ; here 
shall thy proud waves be stayed." 

There was another and earlier pest which I have too 
good occasion to remember, that also reminds us of theso 
words. " When thy judgments are on the earth, th»? in- 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER- 297 

habitants of the world will learn righteousness." It is 
not the cholera, now again threatening our shoreSj to 
which I refer. It raged, and slew many, in the imme- 
diate neighbourhood of my old country parish ; where, 
while trusting to the power of prayer, we did not, as 
some of our would-be philosophers seem to fancy we 
would, neglect the use of means. On the contrary, we 
established a cordon sanitaire around our bounds ; we 
appointed a committee of public health ; we stopped all 
beggars, tinkers, vagrants, on the frontiers ; we got a 
medicine chest for the use of the parish ; we placed it in 
the manse, out of which, having learned late on a Sab- 
bath night that a person had come that evening to the 
village from an infected house in Dundee, I went forth at 
six o'clock on Monday morning, and summoning the 
nearest members of committee, had the intruder bundled 
out of his father's house and the parish too before break- 
fast. We do not need men who regard themselves as 
"advanced thinkers," and talk with an air of superior 
wisdom of the modes of thought of the present day, to 
tell us that we must work as well as pray. It is long 
since Oliver Cromwell told his Ironsides to trust in God 
and keep their powder dry. 

The pest I refer to is the Influenza of 1836-37. No 
place could be more healthily situated than Arbirlot, my 
old country parish. Disease found no allies there in 
crowded houses, or a stagnant atmosphere ; in marshes, 
swamps, or the poisonous effluvia of choked drains and 
cesspools. Arbirlot hung on a slope that declined gently 
to the sandy shores of the German Ocean. Ther-« was 



298 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

wood enough to ornament the landscape, but not to in- 
tercept the fresh breezes that, curling and cresting the 
waves, blew landward from the sea, or swept down sea- 
ward from heights loaded with the fragrance of mown 
hay, or blooming bean-fields, or moors golden with the 
flowers of the gorse. The habits, as well as the habita- 
tions, of my parishioners were highly conducive to health. 
Well-instructed, decent, and sober, out of a population 
amounting nearly to 1000 souls there was only one per- 
son who was not in the habit of attending public wor- 
ship ; only one old enough to be able to read, who could 
not ; and not one, mth the exception of a farmer or two, 
who was addicted to habits of intemperance. Never- 
theless, the influenza of 1836-37, which, I have been 
told, clothed the Edinburgh churches in all but universal 
mourning, and made such demands on the leading physi- 
cians there, that Dr. Abercrombie was said to have worn 
out some pairs of horses per day, came down on my 
parish with the swoop of an eagle. How and whence it 
came, none could tell; but all of a sudden, and in 
almost every house, it was there — " the pestilence that 
walketh in darkness, the destruction that wasteth at 
noon-day." 

For example, on being myself smitten down on a 
Friday, I sent off a servant next day on horseback to the 
farm-houses and hamlets, to warn all that there would be 
nc service in the church on Sabbath : and I remember 
how he reported on his return the same answer from 
almost every house — this, namely. It is of no conse- 
quence ! The disease was there ; and none could go to 



THE PEST, PROVIDEr-CE, AND PRAYER. 299 



church ! Nor was it only in this parish that the pest 
had burst out like a fire. The same had happened in 
the whole country round, shutting up on that Sunday ten 
or eleven of the pulpits of the thirteen parishes embraced 
within the bounds of the Presbytery. It had attacked 
all classes, all ranks, and all ages ; perilling the lives of 
the young, and slaughtering the old. How it was gene- 
rated ; how it was communicated ; what made it a 
destroying angel, moving on the wings of the wind, and 
armed with the dart of death ; how it smote this house, 
and, as if it were protected with paschal blood, passed 
over that, were, and are still, mysteries which eluded the 
closest inquiry. The deeper men went into the subject, 
it grew the darker. Well if men of science were thereby 
taught humility, and those who attempted to penetrate 
the secrets of disease learned to say, "ViTho can, by 
searching, find out God ? Who can find out the Almighty 
to perfection ? It is higher than heaven, what can we 
do : it is deeper than hell, what can we know : the 
measure thereof is longer than the earth, and broader 
than the sea ! " 

While cholera, hanging on the wing, hovers over our 
shores, and threatens to revisit us, it has pleased God to 
send down on our country a new and strange pest. The 
first which I have mentioned — like the disease that years 
ago utterly destroyed the vines of Madeira, and, after 
devastating many parts of Europe, still lingers, as I saw 
this summer, among the lovely valleys of Piedmont — 
fell on the vegetable kingdom. The second pest struck 
at man directly. Nor can it be reasonably doubted tliat^ 



30O THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

but for the superior medical skill, better food, better 
clothing, better lodging, which, as compared with those 
of foimer times, we, in God's good providence, enjoy, 
that pest, the cholera likewise, and also the plague which in 
typhus fever is ever smouldering in our large cities, would 
have proved as fatal as any plague on record — as thst 
which, in the time of Pepys and Defoe, for instance, slew 
10,000 in one week in London, when the population of 
the capital was not a tenth of what it is now ; or that, 
called the sweating sickness, whose ravages in my native 
town, then probably a very small one, for it had been 
repeatedly burnt to the ground by hostile armies, stand 
thus rudely recorded on an old memorial stone within 
the shadow of its cathedral tower : — 

1647. 
Luna quater crescens 
Sexcentos peste peremptos; 
Disce mori, — vidit : 
Pulvis et umbra sumus. 

The third pest, that with which we have now to do, 
threatens, not our Hfe, indeed, but one of its main sup- 
ports. The life of man is sustained either by vegetable, 
or by animal food. Many tribes in tropical countries live 
entirely on the first ; and the savage races who inhabit 
the Arctic regions, hunting the whale, the walrus, .he 
seal, the Polar bear, subsist exclusively on the second. 
Now, in our country, situated midway between the equa- 
tor and the pole, where we subsist both on animal and 
vegetable food, this rinderpest, or, in plain English, 
cattle-plague, threatens to break what is to us, therefore. 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYXR. ^Oi 



a Staff of life. It is not indeed the first plague, nor. so 
far as its ravages have yet gone, is it the worst, which has 
desolated our fields and emptied our byres. One dif- 
ferent perhaps in its nature, but to the full as deadly in 
its effects laid our island waste more than a h?indred 
years ago —such its fatality that almost every cattle beast 
in England died ; one county alone, and that not a large 
one, losing 20,000 head. The possibility of such ra- 
vages by the rinderpest presents a very gloomy prospect, 
involving enormous loss to our country, widely-extended 
suffering, and the utter ruin of thousands of families. 
Already it has wrought very serious ravages. The 
number of cows in Edinburgh is now not more than a 
fourth of what it was when the plague broke out here 
three months ago ; and many expect that every dairy 
in the city will be cleared out by the new year. The 
utmost care on the part of farmers to protect their 
cattle from infection and surround them with everything 
that could contribute to their health has proved utterly 
unavailing. Defying all prevention, and as yet resist- 
ing all cure, the disease is working dreadful havoc in 
many districts of the country. Men are at their wits' 
end. Ruin stares them in the face, and the calamity 
which, unless arrested, will fall so heavily on the large 
and respectable class engaged in agriculture, will be 
felt by the whole community ; this being a case in 
which, if one member suffer, all the members must 
suffer with it. A serious evil to our nurseries, milk, 
the very best food for children, will not be procurable 
either for love or money; and butcher meat, which is 



^\i2 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

coTisnmed to so large an extent by all classes, must rise 
to a price which will place it beyond the reach of the 
labouring population, and many more besides. Such 
being our prospects, winter approaches us with a stem 
and gloomy aspect — suffering to all, to many bank- 
ruptcy and ruin in its train. So serious, indeed, are 
the circumstances of the country, that we should stand 
in dread of their issues, but that we believe in a pre- 
siding Providence and can trust to the efficacy of 
prayer. 

What has Providence to do with this pest ? is a ques- 
tion which some may put ; and I might, with more 
reason, answer thus : Providence has to do with every- 
thing ; a sparrow falleth not to the ground without the 
Father. But I can lay my finger on m?my passages of 
the Bible which in other ages (and why not in this?) 
trace calamities similar to ours to the hand and judgment 
of God. It was of the loss of his cattle, as well as of his 
children, that Job uttered this sublimest of all human 
utterances, " The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken 
away; blessed be the name of the Lord." Let God 
give our farmers a sense of His Providence in this cala- 
mity, with faith in the efficacy of prayer, and they may 
(not otherwise) rise to the height of this sublime expres- 
sion, " Though the flock be cut off from the fold, and 
there shall be no herd in the stall, yet I will rejoice in 
the Lord, and joy in the God of my salvation." I can 
give but a sample of the many instances which are piled 
up around me where the Word of God represents Him 
as ssending such calamities as this plague of the rinder- 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 303 

pest. Hence, and' on the highest authority, we call it a 
providential visitation, which may, or which may not, be 
sent on account of our sins. 

As samples take these : Jeremiah xii. 4, " How long 
shall the land mourn, and the herbs of every field wither 
for the wickedness of them that dwell therein ? the beasts 
are consumed." Jeremiah vii. 17 — 20, " Seest thou not 
what they do in the cities of Judah and in the streets of 
Jerusalem ? The children gather wood, and the fathers 
kindle the fire, and the women knead their dough, to 
make cakes to the queen of heaven, and to pour out 
drink-offerings unto their gods ; therefore thus saith the 
Lord God, Behold, mine anger and my fury shall be 
poured out upon this place upon man, and upon beasts 
Hosea iv. i — 3, " Hear the word of the Lord, ye children 
of Israel : for the Lord hath a controversy with the in- 
habitants of the land, because there is no truth, nor 
mercy, nor knowledge of God in the land. By swear- 
ing, and lying, and killing, and stealing, and committing 
adultery, they break out, and blood toucheth blood. 
Therefore shall the land mourn, and every one that 
dwelleth therein shall languish, with the beasts af the 
field." 

It is the fashion with some in these, as in other days, 
to explain away all, not only that devout Christians, but 
even devout pagans, held and expressed by such words 
as Providence and providential. According to them, all 
events result from certain great, general laws which God 
has ordained for the government of the world. A man, 
for example, leaves a warm room without his great-coat, 



304 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

and catches cold ; drinks too much wine, and loses his 
senses ; eats too much food, and gets a fit- of indigestion ; 
launches recklessly into speculation, and becomes a bank- 
rupt; lives in an ill-drained house, and is seized with 
typhoid fever, and neglecting the use of the proper 
remedies, dies. Well, we have men who claim to them- 
selves the title of "advanced thinkers," alleging that 
there is no more Providence in the most important 
events in the history of individuals, nations, or Churches, 
than in these — that the fall of a kingdom, with all its 
results, is not one whit more providential than that of a 
stone on the hill-side, which when the rains have under- 
mined it, obeying the laws of gravitation, topples over ; 
and rolling, thundering, smoking, leaping in its descent, 
at one great last bound buries itself in the depths of 
the lake. 

No doubt many events, which good men once regarded 
as special interpositions of Providence, can be proved to 
be the natural and inevitable result of those laws which 
God has established for the ordinary government of the 
world. I admit that no rash attempt should be made 
to trace in the common detail of worldly affairs the 
special interference of a superintending Providence ; sin- 
cere and pious Christians having, sometimes, thereby 
exposed religion to the sneer of the scoffer, and over- 
looked this canon even of a heathen poet : — 

Nee Deus intersit nisi dignus vindice nodus 
Incident ; 

" Let not a god interfere unless some difficulty worthy 
of his intervention should occur." That God has esta* 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 305 

blished great general laws for the government of the 
world, on due attention to which our health, happiness, 
and life ordinarily turn — laws which cannot be observed 
without benefit, nor violated without suffering — is no new 
discovery. We hear much, and not too much certainly, 
of the importance of sanitary measures ; but the fact 
that filth is favourable to the production of disease, 
while cleanliness promotes health and prolongs life, was 
as well known to the Jews three thousand years ago as 
it is now — the frequent washings enjoined by the Mosaic 
law, both of their persons and their houses, being sani- 
tary measures as well as spiritual and religious symbols. 
Nor did the Presbytery of Glasgow, when they proposed 
a day of humiliation and prayer on account of the 
cholera, need a late Prime Minister to tell them to 
betake themselves to the cleaning of their dirty closes 
and courts, as a measure not less necessary than prayer. 
The laugh which his taunt afforded sceptics and scoffers 
was as silly, as the taunt itself was uncalled for — the 
Sacred Book, which it was the duty of that reverend 
body to expound, not only containing the oldest, and 
what is in some respects still the best, sanitary code on 
record, but furnishing them with a very pertinent, and 
what had been in the circumstances not impertinent, 
reply to the statesman's jibe, " These ought ye to have 
done, and not leave the other undone." 

Frankly admitting the existence of great general laws, 
we recognise in them the wisdom and goodness of Him 
who governs all events, from the fall of an angel to the 
(all of a sparrow. If fire, for instance, sometimes burned, 



306 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

and at other times froze, like ice ; if meat sometimes 
acted like medicine, and medicine like meat ; if the pro- 
cesses of agriculture yielded a crop on one farm, but 
utterly failed to do so on another ; if " the hand of the 
diligent " made one man rich, but left his neighbour 
poor ; if, in other words, certain causes were not followed 
up by certain results, if the line of sequences could not 
be depended on, the business of the world would come 
to a stand — all things would rush into ruin. Admitting 
this, it by no means follows that, as a man leaves a 
clock, which he has wound up, to go on in its corner of 
hall or room, pointing the hours and striking them till 
the weights have run down, and all is still, and it has 
run its course, God has left man to run out his term of 
life, and the world to run on through its cycle of ages 
under the blind, unmodified, and uncontrolled operation 
of mere general laws. We admit their existence and see 
in them the clearest manifestation of the wisdom and 
goodness, as well as the power, of God. But it by no 
means follows that, in ways beyond the reach of our 
discovery and even the comprehension of our limited 
faculties, ways which we have no language to express, 
nor intelligence to understand, nor even fancy to ima- 
gine, God does not govern our actions and mould our 
fortunes. How is this truth embodied in the words 
which we find enshrined in the Bible, and often illus- 
trated in the disappointments of life, and the experience 
of others as well as Solomon, " I returned, and saw 
under the sun that the race is not to the swift, nor the 
battle to the strong, neither yet bread to the wise, nor 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 307 



yet riches to men of understanding, nor yet favour to 
men of skill." 

Granting the existence and operation of these laws, 
and that sincere and devout Christians have often re- 
garded what were their results as " special providences," 
there are few men who cannot point to certain events in 
their own life which had an important influence on their 
own fortune or that of others, and which they cannot but 
regard as providential. They are not to be explained by 
the ordinary operation of the laws of nature. Without 
drawing on books, it may entertain my readers more, and 
equally illustrate my subject, to relate a case or two of 
the kind belonging to my own individual experience. 

Near by my old country parish there rose from the 
shelving shore a range of iron-bound cliffs, against which, 
in stormy weather, the sea dashed with amazing fury. 
Accompanied by a friend, I one day descended these, in 
search of anemones and seaweed in the pools which the 
ebbing tide left at their feet. While thus engaged, I 
leaped down on a rock that sloped away into the sea, 
then roaring and foaming in a strong north-easter. On 
my feet touching the rock, which was covered, not, as 
I imagined, with dry, but with slippery, seaweed, they 
went out from below me, and I found myself flat on my 
back, launching away into the sea. All the danger of 
the position flashed at once into view — the impossibility 
of swimming, though I could swim, in such a roaring 
surf j a horrid death by being hurled on the jagged 
rocks ; and the certainty that, though I should get hold 
of the slippery fangle, of its sliding from my grasp, and 

X J 



308 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

leaving me to fall back again, wounded and bleeding, 
into the deep. My companion could do nothing, but 
stood petrified at the sight. Yet I was saved to write 
this paper, and do some little work in the world, by — 
what I believe, and, looking our modem philosophers 
in the face, call — God's good Providence. It had been 
a miracle, had a monster of the deep swallowed up a 
man in such circumstances, and, making for a sandy 
bay, vomited him ashore, safe and sound, as Jonah ; a 
miracle, had the sea-birds that soared and screamed over 
the intruder on their domain, borne him aloft on their 
white wings to set him down safe on the top of the 
cliffs. The age of miracles is gone ; but not that of 
the special providence which brings about events where 
reason can, and religion delights to, recognise the hand 
of God. In my circumstances, when I was moving oft 
like a ship from the slips into the deep, life only could 
be saved by the arrest of such a fatal launch. For this 
purpose I put on the brakes, to use railway language, 
pressing strongly with my heels against the rock ; and, 
when descending with constantly accelerating motion — 
my back to the rock, my face to the sky, my ears filled 
with the roar of death, and my feet within less than a 
yard of a watery grave — I was suddenly arrested. It so 
happened that the heels of my boots had been newly 
shod with iron. Being rough, one of them, instead of 
slipping over, caught against a small pebble imbedded 
in the rock ; and I have ever regarded it as a special 
providence that, in this hour of peril, I had in that rough 
iron the only means which could save life ; and that my 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 309 



mind, being kept as calm and collected as it is now, 
I had the self-possession to remember the rough state of 
the iron on my boots, and resort to the one only possible 
means of saving me from a watery grave. 

The scene of another case lies in my own countr}^ 
parish, and the dell where a decent widow lived, whom I 
was in the habit of visiting, as paralysis made it impos- 
sible for her to attend church. She was tended by a 
very dutiful daughter, who, working at a flax-mill in the 
neighbourhood, toiled hard, and contented herself with 
plain dress and simple fare, that she might help to main- 
tain her mother. Before leaving the cottage for her 
work she was in the habit of heaping up the re-fuse of the 
mill in the grate j and kindling it. She placed her help- 
less mother in a chair right before the fire ; and as this 
fuel burned away slowly the old woman was kept com- 
fortable till her return. It happened one day that I left 
my manse, and skirting the walls of the old churchyard, 
and passing the corn-mill, with its busy sound and flash- 
ing wheel, I took my way down the winding dell to the 
cottage of the old woman, which stood in its garden, 
embowered among trees. But, having met a parishioner, 
with whom I had some subject of interest to talk about, 
I called a halt ; and, sitting down on a bank of thyme, 
we entered into conversation. Ere the subject was half 
exhausted, the widow rose to my recollection, I felt 
somehow that I must cut short, and hasten away on my 
visit. But the idea w^as dismissed, and the conversation 
went on. However, it occurred again, and again, till 
with a feeling that I was neglecting a call of duty, as by 



3IO THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER, 

an uncontrollable impulse I rose to my feet, and made 
all haste to the cottage. Opening the door, a sight met 
my eyes that for the moment nailed me to the spot. 

The erection of mill-refuse which had been built from 
the hearth some feet up the wide open chimney, having 
its foundations eaten away, had fallen, and, precipitating 
itself forward, surrounded the helpless paralytic within a 
circle of fire. The accident took place some minutes 
before I entered. She had cried out, but no ear was 
there to hear, nor hand to help. Catching the loose 
refuse around her, on and on, nearer and nearer, the 
flames crept. It was a terrible sight for the two Wig- 
town women-martyrs, staked far out in the sands of the 
Solway Firth, to mark the sea-foam crawl nearer and 
nearer them; it was more terrible still for this lone 
woman in her lone cottage, without any great cause to 
die for, to sit there, and see the fire creeping closer, 
drawing nearer and nearer to her feet. By the time I 
entered, it had almost reached her, where she sat motion- 
less, speechless, pale as death, looking down on the fire 
as it was about to seize her clothes, and burn her to a 
cinder. Ere it caught, I had time, and no more, to 
make one bound from the door to the hearth-stone ; and 
seizing her, chair and all in my arms, to pluck her from 
tlie jaws of a cruel, fiery death. 

Here we recognise the ordinary laws of lature — those 
of fire, which kept alive by the oxygen of the atmosphere, 
consumed the refuse; that of gravitation, which, when 
the fire had ate away the foundation, and left it top- 
heavy, tumbled it on the floor; that of impulse, by 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 3II 

which, when it fell, it was projected beyond the hearth- 
stone to surround the paralytic with the flaming circle. 
But by what law of nature was I moved that day, instead 
of visiting other sick, to turn my steps to the dell and 
cottage of this poor old woman ? By what law of nature, 
when I lingered on the road, was I moved, without the 
remotest idea of her danger, to cut short, against all my 
inclinations, an interesting conversation, and hurry on to 
the house, which I reached just at the very nick of time, 
— one or two minutes later, the flames had caught her 
clothes, and I had found her in a blaze of fire ? To 
look on this as a case of special providence, some may 
regard as superstitious, and denounce as inconsistent 
with the spirit and philosophy of the age — as a mere 
relic of the days of ignorance and darkness. I leave 
them to their cold philosophy, and " science falsely so 
called." Be it mine to live and die in the belief of a 
present, and presiding, as well as personal, God ; in the 
faith which inspired my aged friend to thank Him for 
her wonderful deliverance, and the boy to explain his 
calm courage on the roaring deep, in these simple but 
grand words, " My Father is at the helm." 

Edinburgh was the scene of another case which, a 
matter not of life or death, but of dying peace, I also 
count providential. A lady belonging to my congrega- 
tion, a very lovely Christian — whom I knew to be ill, 
but not in danger — was dying, on a day that I was 
dragging myself home, weary and Avorn-out with long 
hours of work. It occurred to me, on finding myself 
near the street where she lived, that I should go and see 



3ia THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

her ; but feeling more fit for a sofa than further service, 
I dismissed the idea, and walked on thinking of the poet's 
line, — 

" The ploughman homeward plods his weary way." 

But the idea occurred again, only to be again dis- 
missed. I said to myself, There is nothing very serious 
in her case. But it came back again and again. Yet I 
resolved to shake off this feeling, and, walking over it, 
make my way home; and I had actually passed the 
opening of the street where she lived, when the im- 
pression returned with irresistible force ; and, surprised 
by the circumstance, I retraced my steps, and turned 
them to her house. How was I astonished to be m>et at 
the door with the news that she was dying ; and how 
great was my astonishment and grief also, to find this 
best and brightest of saintly women in deep despon- 
dency. A dark cloud hung over that blessed soul; it 
was like the obscuration over the Saviour's cross ; and I 
seemed to hear that awftil cry. My God, my God, why 
hast thou forsaken me ? There we were — she struggling 
with death, and I with her despair. It pleased God so 
to bless the truth I was sent, as I believe, to set before 
her, so to hear the prayers her afflicted and astonished 
mother and I offered up, that ere her sun sank in night, 
it came forth from the cloud brilliant, and to appearance 
larger than ever. Death in the dark had made no even- 
tual difference to this true and loving follower of the 
Lamb of God ; but the lifting of the cloud, turning her 
latter end into peace, made a mighty difference to the 
mourners around her bed, and especially to her eminently 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 313 

devout and pious mother. She who had been left, like 
many other ministers' widows, to struggle with poverty 
and privation, had been borne up, as few have been, by 
her remarkable faith in a presiding providence. That 
venerable woman saw God's hand in everything. Her 
Father had done this; and her Father had sent that. 
And for myself, I wish that I had the same ever-present, 
magnanimous, holy trust in God's providence, as bore 
her through a sea of troubles, and made her regard me 
that day as sent to do an angel's office ; to smooth her 
Jeannie's entrance into a better world — ministering to 
an heir of salvation. 

It is not always, I admit, easy to distinguish the 
merely marvellous from the providential, nor the provi- 
dential from the miraculous ; and many things which 
sincere and pious Christians have fondly considered as 
special interpositions of Providence ; may, I grant, admit 
of much controversy. But to regard all events as but 
the result of the common laws of nature, is in effect to 
shut God out from the government of his own world. 
To represent him as standing by, a mere spectator, with 
his hands, so to speak, tied, so that He can neither in- 
terpose to confer blessings nor inflict judgments, is to 
mock Him with the shadow of a kingly crown, and clip 
the wings by which, lifting us above the cloudy regions 
of care and doubt, prayer raises us to the skies. It 
may be in a way unknown to, and inscrutable by, us, 
but unless God interposing takes an actual and active 
part in our fate and fortunes, I see no sense in prayer. 

Rushing into regions where man loses himself and 



314 THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 

reason fails to guide his faltering steps, some, like those 
of old, who by wisdom knew not God, set forth crude 
and ill-digested notions which they dignify by the name 
of philosophy. But however ingeniously it be spun out 
of their brains, that philosophy must be false which is 
not only contrary to the plain sense of the Word of God, 
but is also, and not less, contrary to the universal in- 
stinct and promptings of our nature. I could stand on 
that alone. If the soul is not immortal, why do all men 
yearn for, and believe in, immortality ? If prayer has 
no real, direct eflicacy, why do all nations, civilised and 
savage, pagan as well as Christian, resort to it for relief ; 
and, as we see in the case of the lowest and most de- 
based heathens, rather than not pray, address their peti- 
tions to a stock or stone ? It seems as much an instinct 
for man in want to pray, as for an infant, put to the 
breast, to suck. And He who inspired the instinct is no 
more in this case than in that " a man that he should 
lie, or the son of man that he should repent." 

As to the modus operandi of prayer, as to how it works, 
and moves the hand that moves the world, that is a sub- 
ject into which man with his limited faculties cannot too 
reverently enter, and about which the profoundest theo- 
logians cannot too modestly speak. As Cowper sings — 

*' God moves in a mysterious way 
His wonders to perform ; 
He plants his footsteps on the sea, 
And rides upon the storm." 

But, as even nature teaches, and his Word clearly re- 
veals, He will have all men to pray; and, to use the 



THE PEST, PROVIDENCE, AND PRAYER. 315 



words of an inspired Apostle, " no respecter of persons, 
he that feareth him and worketh righteousness is ac- 
cepted with him." Therefore, while we acknowledge an 
Almighty hand in the pest which, marching ruthless and 
meanwhile resistless through the land, is destro)dng our 
herds, ruining the fortunes of many, and threatening the 
comforts of all, let us resort to prayer. Along with the 
utmost vigilance and the use of the most active Aieans to 
stop the progress of the plague, and effect its cure, let 
prayer ascend from all our cities, our scattered villages, 
and country homesteads. And who can tell but that 
God, notwithstanding our unworthiness, may repent Him 
of the evil ^ and a grateful nation, rising from the ground 
where prince and peasant had bent before his mighty 
hand, may soon unite all voices in this grand old chorus : 
"Thou crownest the year with thy goodness : and thy 
paths drop fatness. They drop upon the pastures of the 
wilderness ; and the little hills rejoice on every side. 
The pastures are clothed with flocks, the valleys also are 
covered over with com; they shout for joy; they also 




WATCH-NIGHT. 

Half-past twelve^ A.M., \st Jawuary^ 1866. 
HAVE just returned from holding "Watch- 
night " with a congregation of Wesleyan Me- 
thodists. Never having witnessed its services, 
perhaps ignorant even of the existence of such a custom, 
many of my readers may be ready to ask, " Watch- 
night, what is it ? " If Churches knew each other better, 
it might promote their mutual improvement, and also the 
interests of brotherly kindness and Christian charity. 
With this view I shall tell my readers something of the 
very impressive and solemn service, called Watch-night, 
with which, standing on the line that parts them, the 
Wesleyans take farewell of the old year and hail the 
advent of the new. 

It is a fact, though by many sound Protestants and 
Christians who observe them never so much as supposed, 
that some of our old customs had their origin in Popish, 
others in older and Pagan times. Let me relate two re- 
markable examples of this which I saw some years ago 
when making atour in the north and north-west of Scotland. 



WATCH-NIGHT. 3I7 



In Loch Maree, where, next to Switzerland, the exquisite 
beauty of the lake, and the magnificent mountains that 
frame it, raise one's mind from nature up to nature's 
God, there is an island — one of the many that lie like 
gems on its bosom — which once boasted a well of heal- 
ing virtues. Till the Saint whose name it bears took 
offence at a man who dipped a favourite dog into it to cure 
him of madness, its waters, so say the people, were a 
panacea for all the ills that flesh is heir. On being so 
profaned, the well, which owed its miraculous virtues to 
the merits of the Saint, became dry. Partly in conse- 
quence of this belief, and partly in consequence of the 
progress of education, it has now ceased to be resorted 
to j but a tree which stands by it, proves to what a late 
period this old popish superstition retained its hold of 
this Protestant and Presbyterian district. It presents a 
sight one would expect to meet only in benighted Ire- 
land. I saw the branches that hang over the empty 
well covered with votive offerings — a relic of Popery 
among a people who would have been as loth to trust in 
the merits of a dead saint, as in the dements of a living 
sinner. 

Such another well, but associated with an older time, 
stands near by the house of CuUoden in Inverness-shire. 
Its waters at a certain period of the year, like those of 
the Pool of Siloam at the descent of the angel, were be- 
lieved to acquire a miraculous virtue. This was on the 
first Sunday of the month of May. On the morning of 
that day, hundreds resorted to it, either to drink and be 
themselves cured, or drawing water, and taking care that 



3l8 WATCH-NIGHT. 



not a drop was spilt lest the charm should be broken, to 
carry it to sick and bed-rid fri-ends. May was a month 
sacred to the god of the sun ; that being the period when 
Baal's rites were performed by our rude and savage an^ 
cestors, long before the introduction of Christianity. 
Though our country has no sturdier Protestants, or 
people who have a higher regard for the Sabbath, than 
the inhabitants of the surrounding district, down to a 
recent period crowds of them resorted to this old pagan 
well. I found many votive offerings on a tree which 
drooped over it — in buttons and copper coins that were 
stuck in its bark ; and worsted threads, bits of cloth and 
ribbons of all colours that hung fluttering from its boughs. 
From these wells, whence I drew no water, I drew a les- 
son of charity. The strong hold which these old popish 
and even pagan superstitions long continued to maintain 
over a devout and seriou« people, taught me to wonder 
less that churches should retain, on the one hand, forms 
which, though they have no sanction in Scripture, are of 
a venerable antiquity : and reject, on the other hand, im- 
provements in the services of public worship, merely 
because they are innovations on old-established cus- 
toms. 

How long, like the remnants of the Hittites, Periz- 
zites, and Canaanites in the land of Israel, heathen cus- 
toms will survive in a Christian country, has no more 
remarkable illustration than those supply which, in strong 
contrast to the Methodist " Watch-night," usher in the 
year. Little do good Christians, when they take part in 
these, think that they are engaged in pagan rites. But 



WATCH-NIGHT. 319 



SO it is. For example, on the last night of the year the 
ancient Druids went forth in solemn procession \ the 
high priest at their head carrying a golden bill-hook or 
sickle. Reverently approaching the sacred oak, he cut 
the mistletoe from its gnarled boughs ; and this, being 
brought into the towns and carried to the houses of their 
chiefs, was distributed among the people. Cut down on 
the proper night with golden instrument and by priestly 
hands, this curious parasite became sacred to their god, 
and acquired the virtues of a potent charm. As such it 
was hung up in the rafters to preserve their houses from 
evil, and worn also as an amulet to protect their persons 
on the field of battle. And now, in the nineteenth cen- 
tury, a thousand years and more after heathenism had 
disappeared, in a country of bibles, churches, schools, 
and sabbaths, here we are in the use of the mistletoe 
that at Christmas and New Year's time garnishes our 
houses and looks down on happy meetings of gathered 
families and loving friends, observing an old pagan rite. 
The term " Yule," and the cry " Hogmanay " with which 
our boyhood was familiar at New Year's time, and which 
is of universal usage, at least in Scotland, are both relics 
of heathenism — it being by this cry that the people were 
summoned to the sacrifices of their god, and to his fes- 
tival, v/hich they celebrated with revels and universal 
conviviality. We might wonder why a period of the year 
specially calculated to excite solemn and serious thoughts 
should ever have been set apart for entertainments cal- 
culated rather to dissipate than excite such thoughts, and 
for convivial indulgences which often equalled, perhaps 



330 WATCH-NIGHT. 



exceeded, in their drunken excesses those of heathenism. 
But this accounts for it. Nor is it difficult to explain 
how these and also other customs survived the pagan 
worship to which they originally belonged. It is well 
known that the term Easter is taken from the worship of 
the old goddess Astarte, or Ashtaroth : it is equally well- 
known that the robes of the Roman Catholic priesthood, 
and very many of the forms through which they go, were 
copied from those of heathen temples ; and the door by 
which these and other corruptions came into the Christian 
Church, was the well-intended but unwise policy of her 
early missionaries. They sought to convert the heathen 
by accommodating the new worship to the seasons and 
fashions of the old. Impatient, animated by zeal, but in 
many instances zeal without knowledge, the good men 
who found it difficult to abolish the pagan rites and for- 
got that " he who believeth shall not make haste," en- 
deavoured to give them a Christian turn. So, finding it 
hare to wean the people from their old habit of cutting 
the mistletoe, they sought to baptize it to Christianity, 
and to win or please converts by hanging it up in their 
churches ; while they winked at, if they did not encou- 
rage, the feasting and banqueting, the eating and drink- 
ing, the fun and folly, with which the pagans at New 
Year's time celebrated the festival of their god. 

It was not long ere the Church found out her mistake, 
in acting on expediency rather than on principle. The 
feasting and merriment which, for the purpose of recon- 
ciling them to Christianity, she allowed her converts to 
continue indulging in at New Year's time, reached a vast 



WATCH-NIGHT. 32I 



height in France, for instance. Strong complaints were 
made to the Gallic Synods of great excesses being com- 
mitted on the last night of the old and the first of the 
new year. It appears that companies of both sexes, 
dressed in fantastic habits, and called bachelettes or gui- 
sarts, ran about the streets, and entered even the 
churches, disturbing the devotion of the worshippers. 
Cr)dng, " Au gui menez, Tire-lire-Mainte du blanc et 
point du bis," they demanded both money and wassaiL 
This will recall to Scotchmen (I know not if to English- 
men also) the name of guizards, given to those who in 
our early days went about painted and masked, singing 
songs, and also their cry, " Give us your white bread and 
none of your grey ? " The Bishop of Angres, who says 
that the cries of the guisarts were derived from the 
ancient Druids, makes grievous complaints of the licen- 
tiousness of the people at New Year's time. To such an 
extent indeed was their bacchanalianism carried in his 
day, that the French Government had to step forward 
and repress it by the strong arm of the law. 

This history teaches us, as do many things else, that 
there is no reformation so good in its ultimate results as 
what our fathers called a " root-and-branch " one. To 
win over the heathen, by removing impediments which 
interpose between them and Christianity, some mis- 
sionaries in our day have lent a sort of sanction to poly- 
gamy, and permitted their converts to continue practices 
that properly belong to idolatry. And when we see good 
men even now persuading themselves that such measures 
are lawful, need we wonder that in earlier and less 

Y 



32S WATCH-NIGHT. 



enlightened times the apostles of Northern Europe en- 
deavoured to compromise matters by engrafting the new 
religion on some portions of the old ? Compromises in 
worldly affairs which involve no question of truth and 
principle, cannot be too much commended. In moral 
and religious matters, they cannot be too strongly con- 
demned. Let the Churches beware of establishing any such 
truce between truth and falsehood. Many of these are 
separated on what might be called points rather than 
principles ; on matters of remote and doubtful inference 
rather than of plain and direct revelation. But though I 
therefore think that union among Protestant denomina- 
tions is not only exceedingly desirable, but much more 
attainable than many suppose, yet no scheme toward it, 
toward the conversion of the heathen, or toward recon- 
ciling worldly men to religion, to Christ and his cross, 
should be entertained that involves the smallest compro- 
mise either of the doctrines or the morals of our holy 
faith. This were to sew a piece of new cloth into an old 
garment, to pour new wine into old bottles. 

Though I have traced the peculiar and convivial cus- 
toms of the new year to paganism, I should be sorry that 
any one supposed that I regard otherwise than with favour 
the kindly greetings and gifts, the family gatherings and 
innocent convivialities, which make the shortest among 
the happiest days of the year. Happy the homes where 
songs as well as psalms drown the roaring of the storm, 
and affection and mirth diffuse such light and warmth 
within the house as to make us forget the biting cold and 
darkness without. In foretelling the return of God's 



WATCH-NIGHT. 323 



banished people, Jeremiah says that '' in all their dwell- 
ings shall be heard the voice of thanksgiving and the 
voice of them that make merry," and so should oui 
homes be, when, saying with the poet — 

" I saw the skirts of the departing year," 

we hail the advent of its successor. But it is sad to tai.a 
farewell of the old year without any grateful remembrance 
of its mercies, and sorrowful thought of its sins ; to have 
the mirth without the thanksgiving ; and reckless of the 
temptations, and trials, and sorrows, and difficulties and 
deaths the new year may bring, to allow that to run into 
excess, and our convivialities into debauchery. The time 
is one for enjoyment ; but not certainly more for enjoy- 
ment than for suitable reflections on the past, and good 
resolutions for the future. And it is shocking to see 
these drowned in the drinking-bowl — the voice of con- 
science lost in riot and uproar ! 

But without anxious and even prayerful care, the cus- 
toms of the season were very apt to lead to excess. For 
instance, in the old times in England, the head of the 
house assembled his family round a bowl of spiced ale, 
and drinking their healths, handed it round to the others, 
— every one as he lifted the bowl saying in good old 
Saxon, " Waes hael, or " To your health ; " an expression 
in which we find the origin of the word wassail^ — the 
wassail-bowi. A similar custom prevailed, and to some 
extent still prevails, in Scotland. When the clock struck 
twelve the members of the family drank to each other's 
health in th@ kotJ>int, as it was called ; following this up 

y 3 



3J4 WATCH-NIGHT. 



with dances and mirth and merry-making. Nor was this 
all ; it was succeeded by what proved a much greater 
temptation to sobriety and virtue. Carrying this bowl, 
replenished with ale and spices, they sallied forth to visit 
their neighbours, entering each house with uproarious 
cheers, and exchanging friendly greetings in drink given 
and received. A very common result of this first footing^ 
as it was called, and of the drink besides friendly greet- 
ings which they exchanged with all whom they encoun- 
tered on the road, was that ere the new year had almost 
begun, conviviality had run into riot, and brutal drunken- 
ness lay in the gutters, or went staggering along the 
streets. And, though the habits of this age are a great 
improvement on former times — not indeed because the 
whisky-bottle has been substituted for the hot pint — our 
towns still present many disgraceful spectacles at New 
Year's time. In walking the streets of Edinburgh how 
have I been filled with disgust and sorrow ! — thankful, 
however, that it was not the season when foreigners 
visited the city, else we must have blushed for our 
country and its religion as we looked them in the face. 

Edinburgh, more perhaps than any other place, used 
to celebrate the New Year with Saturnalian rites. The 
principal streets were more thronged between twelve 
and one o'clock on New Year's Day morning than at 
mid-day in the full tide of business ; and, as if to make 
up for their usually strict and grave, if not stem, de- 
meanour, the people, like a bow too strongly bent and 
suddenly unbent, sprang into the opposite extreme. 
Even women relaxed not a little of their usual modesty \ 



WATCH-NIGHT. ^2$ 



and grave citizens became bacchanalians. So soon as 
the Tron Church steeple rang out the midnight hour, 
a tremendous shout rose and rent the air. At that 
signal the crowd rushed into the wildest excesses ; and 
orgies were begun, with little distinction of sex, age, or 
rank, that, traceable to the days of paganism, were a dis- 
grace to Christianity. Happily, this pagan institution, 
as it might be called, has never recovered from a blow 
it received some fifty or sixty years ago. The city roughs 
and blackguards of that time combined together to turn 
the occasion into one of plunder. The least resistance 
offered them was met by assaults, so violent and bloody 
that in several instances they resulted in death. Justice 
had to draw her sword : and the end of the Saturnalia 
was a spectacle which filled the city with pity, and grief, 
and horror. Three boys who had been engaged in the 
robberies and violences of that night, were brought out 
to the scaffold, and hanged up in the face of the sun. 
The stem and terrible lesson was not lost. These three 
young corpses, turning slowly in the wind, made an inde- 
lible impression on the mind of Edinburgh ; and as the 
drunken orgies of the season have ever since then been 
checked — we cannot say altogether eradicated — the event 
was one of many which show how God in his providence 
makes good spring out of evil, and crime find a cure in 
its own excesses. 

Whether it was for the purpose of checking the ex- 
cesses of this season by a better and more Christian way, 
that John Wesley established a " Watch-night " at New 
Year's time, I know not Probably it was. The revival 



3*6 WATCH-NIGHT. 



among the Methodists of this very ancient custom was 
not due, however, to the new year, or to its excesses. 
The earhest notice of it in Wesley's Journal is in these 
terms — " Friday, y^;2. 9, 1742. — We had the first watch- 
night in London. We commonly choose for this solemn 
service the Friday night nearest the full moon, either 
before or after, that those of the congregation who live 
at a distance may have light to their several homes. The 
service begins at half an hour past eight, and continues 
till a little after midnight. We have often found a pe- 
culiar blessing at these seasons. There is generally a 
deep awe upon the congregation, perhaps in some 
measure owing to the silence of the night, particularly 
in singing the hymn with which we commonly conclude — 

' Hearken to the solemn voice, 

The awful midnight cry ! 
Waiting souls, rejoice, rejoice, 
And feel the Bridegroom nigh.' " 

Elsewhere he writes, " About this time I was informed 
that several persons in Kingswood frequently met to- 
gether at the school; and, when they could spare the 
time, spent the greater part of the night in prayer and 
praise and thanksgiving. Some advised me to put an 
end to this ; but upon weighing the thing thoroughly, 
and comparing it with the practice of the ancient Chris- 
tians, I could see no cause to forbid it. Rather, I be- 
lieved it might be made of more general use. So I sent 
them word, I designed to watch with them on the Friday 
nearest the full moon, that we might have light thither 
and back again. I gave public notice of this the Sunday 



WATCH-NIGHT. 3*7 



before, and withal, that I intended to preach ; desiring 
that they, and they only, would meet me there who could 
do it without prejudice to their business or families. On 
Friday abundance of people came. I began preaching 
between eight and nine, and we continued till a little 
beyond the noon of night, singing, prapng, and praising 
God. This we have continued to do once a month ever 
since in Bristol, London, and Newcastle, as well as Kings- 
wood ; and exceeding great are the blessings we have 
found therein : it has generally been an extremely solemn 
season, when the word of God sank deep into the heart 
even of those who till then knew Him not. If it be 
said, * This was only owing to the novelty of the thing 
(the circumstance which still draws such multitudes 
together at those seasons), or perhaps to the awful 
silence of the night,' I am not careful to answer in this 
matter. Be it so : however, the impression then made 
on many souls has never been effaced. Now, allowing 
that God did make use either of the novelty or any 
other indifferent circumstance in order to bring sinners 
to repentance, yet they are brought. And herein let us 
rejoice together. Nay, may I not put the case farther 
yet? If I can probably conjecture that, either by the 
novelty of this ancient custom, or by any other indif- 
ferent circumstance, it is in my power to * save a soul 
from death, and hide a multitude of sins,' am I clear 
before God if I do it not? — if I do not snatch that 
brand out of the burning ? " 

" Sir," says Wesley elsewhere, in repelling the attack 
of a Rev. Mr. Baily of Cork, " you charge me with hold* 



328 WATCH-NIGHT. 



ing 'midnight assemblies.' Sir, did you never see the 
word ' Vigil ' in your Common Prayer Book ? Do you 
know what it means? If not, permit me to tell you.^ 
that it was customary with the ancient Christians tc 
spend whole nights in prayer ; and that these nights 
were termed Vigilce, or Vigils. Therefore, for spending 
a part of some nights in this manner, in public and 
solemn prayer, we have not only the authority of our 
national Church, but of the universal Church in the 
earHest ages." 

So wrote John Wesley. To those who blamed him 
for setting his hymns to tunes that, though of great 
merit, were in many cases associated with profane songs, 
he had replied, " I see no reason why the devil should 
have all the good music." No wonder that this same 
man, like soldiers who dash boldly on a park of artillery 
to seize it and turn on the enemy their own guns, should 
conceive and carry out the idea of turning a night of 
debauchery into one of devotion — at least of such 
services as would by God's blessing guard people from 
excess, and teach them to join trembling with theii 
mirth. Wise in his generation as the children of this 
world in theirs, Wesley did not think it enough simply 
to denounce the drinking and debauchery of the time. 
He knew human nature better. He was not ignorant of 
the principle which Dr. Chalmers illustrates in one of 
his noblest sermons, this, namely, " the expulsive power 
of a new affection." So, without attempting to altogether 
abolish an old custom, he said, By all means celebrate 
the advent of the New Year, not, however, with the 



WATCH-NIGHT. 329 



dissipation of pagans, but the devotion of Christians, 
And in this exercise we resolved to take part, with a 
congregation of his followers, on the last night of 1865. 

We repaired to their chapel a little after ten o'clock. 
The riot of the streets had already begun; and it was 
a great relief to escape from them, and find ourselves 
quietly seated amidst a congregation whose counte- 
nances, as became their position, bore a mingled ex- 
pression of happir.ess and solemnity. It was pleasant 
to see so large an assembly on such a night and at such 
an hour; and to recognise numbers who though, like 
ourselves, belonging to another than the Wesleyan com- 
munion, had gone to unite with their brethren of that 
Church in the solemn, striking service which I proceed 
to describe. 

The minister appeared in the pulpit punctually at 
half-past ten, robed in gown and bands — a costume, by 
the way, not used by the Methodists in England, though 
their Conference has too much good sense to quarrel 
with its use in Scotland, or to insist in such minor mat- 
ters on a rigid and unnatural uniformity. He began 
the services by reading out a hymn, which the people 
sang with Methodist spirit to the music of an organ. 
The full burst of their earnest and ringing voices all but 
drowned the sound of its pipes, and demonstrated that 
an organ, whatever objections people may have to in- 
strumental music as an aid to psalm singing, does not 
always, and need never, supersede or interfere with 
vocal praise — the song of grateful hearts rising from 
hallowed lips. They sang: — 






330 ur WATCH-NIGHT. 



" Jesus tiJkeJt!(^piiqueror reigns, 
In glorious strength arrayed. 
His kingdom over all maintains. 
And bids the earth be glad. 

'* Ye sons of men, rejoice 
In Jesu's mighty love; 
Lift up your heart, lift up your voice, 
To Him Who rules above. 

" Extol His kingly power; 
Kiss the exalted Son, 
Who died, and lives to die no more. 
High on His Father's throne. 

*' Our Advocate with God, 
He undertakes our cause, 
And spreads thro' all the earth abroad 
The victory of His cross. 

" That bloody banner see, 

And in your Captain's sight, 
Fight the good fight of faith with me — 
My fellow-soldiers, fight! '' 

After this, Mr. James, the minister, offered up a very 
impressive prayer, acknowledging the mercies and also 
the sins of the past year — seeking grateful hearts and 
pardon through the blood of Christ — in view of the year 
about to enter, renewing vows and dedications to God, 
with earnest prayer for grace to do its duties, to meet 
its trials, to resist its temptations, to bear its burdens 
and to be ready for the deaths it might bring. Another 
hymn was then supg, and the 90th Psalm, beginning 
with these words: " Lord, thou hast been our dwelling- 
place in all generations," read, — and read impressively. 
After the congregation had again sung, the minister 



WATCH NIGHT. 33 1 



choosing for his subject those words of I. Samuel vii. 1 2, 
" Samuel took a stone, and set it between Mizpeh and 
Shen, and called the name of Eben-ezer, saying 
Hitherto hath the Lord helped us," delivered an ap- 
propriate address. At its close the congregation 
sang: — 

" How many pass the guilty night 
In revellings and frantic mirth ! 
The creature is their sole delight, 

Their happiness the things of earth; 
For us suffice the season past ; 
We choose the better part at last, 

*' We will not close our wakeful eyes, 
We will not let our eyelids sleep, 
But humbly lift them to the skies 

And all a solemn vigil keep: 
So many years on sin bestowed, 
Can we not watch one night for God ? 

" We can, O Jesus, for Thy sake, 

Devote our every hour to Thee: 
Speak but the word, our souls shall wake, 

And sing with cheerful melody ; 
Thy praise shall our glad tongues employ. 
And every heart shall dance for joy. 

" O may we all triumphant rise, 

With joy upon our heads return, 
And far above those nether skies. 

By Thee on eagle's wings upborne, 
Thro' all yon radiant circles move. 
And gain the highest heaven of love ! " 

The minister now descended, and resigned the pulpit 
for half an hour to a local preacher; and I may remark, 
by the way, that his address, directed chiefly in warning 



33* WATCH-NIGHT. 



words to young men and women, proved that, though a 
liberal education is of great value to ministers, he may- 
be an effective speaker who has never been at college. 
A few minutes before twelve o'clock this worthy man 
brought his remarks to a close. Mr. Jame§ returned to 
the pulpit -J and having addressed the congregation in a 
few solemn and weighty words, he said that there were 
now only some two or three minutes of the old year to 
run, and these he would recommend them to pass in 
secret communion with God. Then the whole congre- 
gation, following his example, bowed the head, and fell 
on their knees in silent prayer. During these few 
minutes an awful solemnity filled the house, — a still- 
ness on which the hour, as it struck one beat on the 
clock, announcing that one year was gone and another 
begun, broke with startling effect. At Manchester, where 
I first witnessed this most impressive service, the eftect 
was still greater. There, the clock rang out its full 
twelve beats; and as they slowly and solemnly suc- 
ceeded each other, they sounded like the last dying 
throbs of the expiring year. So soon as the ringing out 
the old and ringing in the new year had brought us to 
the end of one and the beginning of another stage in 
life's journey, the whole congregation rose to their feet ; 
and, like men who spring forward anew, on a heaven- 
ward race, for a heavenly crown, they burst out into 
this song: — 

** Come, let us anew our journey pursue, 
Roll round with the year, 
And never stand still till the Master appear 



WATCH-NIGHT. 333 



His adorable will let us gladly fulfil, 

And our talents improve, 
By the patience of hope, and the labour of lovei 

•* Our life is a dream ; our time as a stream 

Glides swiftly away ; 
And the fugitive moment refuses to stay. 
The arrow is flown ; the moment is gone ; 

The millennial year 
Rushes on to our view, and eternity's here. 

*• O that each in the day of His coming may say, 

* I have fought my way through, 

I have finished the work Thou didst give me to do.* 
O that each from his Lord may receive the glad word, 

* Well and faithfully done ; 

Enter into my joy, and sit down on my throne.' " 

Ere the echoes of the hymn had died away, the minis- 
ter rose to pronounce the blessing; and, the service 
closed, we went out into the starry night to hear the 
sound of revelry and riot — but to see nothing incon- 
gruous with our devotions in many of the congregation 
tarrying at the door to salute their acquaintances with 
a " Happy New Year 1 " and much hearty shaking of 
hands. 

The most remarkable and impressive feature of this 
service was perhaps the depth and solemnity of the 
silence that filled the house, while the congregation en- 
gaged in secret prayer during the last moments of the 
old, dying year. It reminded me of scenes I had wit- 
nessed abroad at one of the most solemn parts of Roman 
Catholic worship. When the priest, after working the 
miracle of the mass, turns round to hold aloft at the full 
stretch of his arms, not in bread and wine a symbol of 



534 WATCH-NIGHT. 



Christ's body, but, as the people are taught to believC; 
the very flesh and blood of the Son of God, the effect is 
quite remarkable. It is exceedingly impressive indeed, 
if the scene be a vast and noble cathedral, with its lofty 
pillars, and solemn aisles, and dim religious light, and 
foil to the door with thousands of worshippers. At that 
moment, as if with one soul, the mighty congregation 
drop on their knees, and every head is bent adoring to 
the ground. Standing near by the high altar, with the 
sea of faces before us, it is wonderful to look out over 
these thousands, — all motionless as statues, amid silence 
deep as the grave's. There is no such silence outside, 
in nature ; not on the shore, where in the quietest day 
wavelets break, and sea-birds scream ; nor in the gloom 
of the forest, where the wind goes whispering among the 
branches, and withered leaves fall whirling to the ground ; 
nor in the loneliest glen, where the distant baying of a 
watch-dog, the murmur of a hidden stream, the hum of 
bee or beetle, relieves the silence. Yonder, with their 
God held on high before prostrate thousands, no sound 
whatever — rustle of gown, ruffle of moving foot, lowest 
whisper — falls on the ear. Each one, penetrated with 
awe, seems to hold his breath — the scene, the deep still- 
ness such a5 to remind the spectator of these Scriptures, 
" There was silence in heaven," " I fell at his feet as 
dead." 

" Watch-night " among the Methodists, outraging 
neither human reason nor God's Word, as the other does, 
is, even in its outward aspect, not less impressive. At 
the solemn midnight hour, and on the eve of another 



WATCH-NIGHT. 335 



year, the voice of man is stilled ; and, amid the deepest 
silence, the whole living assembly, each as if he g«ere 
alone, engages in inward prayer. The time, the place, 
the awful stillness, the vast multitude around, each hold- 
ing secret communion with God, presents a scene that 
might sober a bacchanalian, and move the most indif- 
ferent to prayer. And now may I not ask, why should 
not all other Churches, in the Methodists' new-year'a 
night service, take a leaf out oi their book, wherever cir- 
cumstances render it both practicable and convenient ? 
The bigotry of Papists is not worse than, or indeed so 
inexcusable as, that which maintains we have nothing to 
learn from others in the ordinances of God's house and 
worship. It were ludicrous, if it was not sad, to find 
good Protestants who deny infallibility to the Pope, and 
yet, resisting all change, seem to regard their fathers or 
themselves as infallible ; and their own old system as 
so perfect that it is incapable of improvement. What 
else is that than to say, " The temple of the Lord, the 
temple of the Lord are we ! " 

Very seldom have I worshipped with ChristiarxS of 
other denominations, either at home or abroad, with my 
countrymen, or with foreigners — French, Swiss, Geimans, 
or Italians, — without seeing something in their churches 
which I would have been happy to engraft on my own. 
And this is a feeling, I venture to say, common to all 
who, while enjoying the privilege of worshipping with 
other denominations, have sought to see in their services 
not what they might condemn, but might admire and 
imitate. It is good to be conservative, but not of 



33^ WATCH-NIGHT. 



defects. In these days of bold attacks, from unexpected 
quarters, on our most sacred and cherished beUefs, let 
all on the watchtowers of Zion sound forth, " Thus saith 
the Lord, Stand ye in the ways and see, and ask for the 
old paths, where is the good way, and walk therein, and 
ye shall find rest for your souls." But though it is our 
duty to keep by the old roads, it may not be our duty to 
keep by the old ruts. Between old roads and old ruts, 
there is a great and too much forgotten distinction. 
What is commendable in Churches other than our own, 
why should we be such bigots as not to copy ? Who can 
afford to dispense with what other good, intelligent, and 
pious Christians have found to be aids to devotion ? The 
tide runs strong the other way ; and we need to crowd 
all sail on the mast to advance in grace, and at length 
arrive in heaven. 

To the lateness of these Watch-night services no one 
can justly object. They occur but once a year; and 
hours as late are not held a valid objection to balls, to 
theatres, or even to the occasionally protracted social 
meetings of such as would frequent neither the one nor 
the other. Where can we so well take leave of the old 
year with all its sins to answer for, or enter on the new 
with all its trials to encounter, as in the House of God ? 
The solemnities of the service are eminently calculated 
to restrain the excesses of the season. They teach us, 
what we are prone to forget, amid its festivities to rejoice 
with trembling. Nor can I doubt were all our congre- 
gations, where convenient, to meet after the fashion of 
the Methodists,— as is dope in some Episcopalian 



WATCH-NIGHT. 337 



churches in London — many of our people would bless 
God, and say with Wesley, "Exceeding great are 

THE BLESSINGS WE HAVE FOUND THEREIN : IT HAS 
GENERALLY BEEN AN EXTREMELY SOLEMN SEASON 
WHERE THE WORP OF GOD SANK DEEP INTO THE 
HEART." 




THE RECHABITES. 

T is a safe rule to avoid illustrations drawn from 
ships when preaching at a seaport, or from 
battle-fields in a garrison, or from pastoral 
scenes to a congregation of shepherds. The reason of 
this is obvious. The preacher being much less perfectly 
acquainted with the subject that furnishes the illustration 
than his hearers, he is very likely to commit some blunder 
which the humblest of them can detect ; and by this, ex- 
pose himself and, what is a much more serious evil, his 
great theme to contempt. So it once fell out with a 
friend of mine when occupying a pulpit in the Highlands 
of Forfarshire. He, not unnaturally, thought that the 
twenty-third Psalm offered peculiarly suitable topics of 
discourse to the natives of a glen ; and having a remark- 
ably good opinion of himself, he never doubted, though 
a dweller in the plains, that with his knowledge of the 
habits both of shepherds and their sheep, his sermon 
would prove a success. 

It fell out otherwise ; and thus. Among these hills 



THE RECHABITES. 339 



the temperature even in summer is cold rather than hot : 
full of springs and streams, their herbage is succulent ; 
and it is rarely indeed that their pastures, like those of 
Italy or Palestine, are so burned by long droughts and 
scorching suns as to remind one of the Bible figure 
"withered like grass." This being the case, the sheep 
of the Grampians are independent of water ; nor, though 
it is abundantly supplied by loch and dark tarn, dancing 
streams and green mossy wells where the deer slakes his 
thirst, do they ever drink — unless, indeed, when they are 
ill. Ignorant of this, the preacher expatiated on " the 
still waters" of the Psalm — telling his amazed hearers 
that the Gospel was as much needed by them as water 
by their fleecy charges, and exhorting them to seek and 
enjoy its mercies as they knew their sheep did the river 
and the mountain streams. Now they knew the reverse 
of this to be true ; and concluded that the preacher 
must be very ignorant since he did not know what even 
their children knew ; and as they lingered to light their 
pipes by the church-door, he had the mortification, on 
retiring, to hear himself and his sermon treated with 
contempt ; one saying to another, jPuir dodze, heard yt 
ever the like d yon about a sheep drinking 1 

The habits of the lower animals change to a certain 
extent with culture and climate. So, indeed, do those 
of man himself — the natives of hot countries, for ex- 
ample, living chiefly on vegetables, while the Esqui- 
maux, to maintain their vital heat amid the rigours of 
Greenland, rei|uire, as well as use, the fattest animal 
food — seal, whale, and walrus. So, in consequence of 

z a 



340 THE RECHABITES. 



the dry herbage and great heat, the sheep of those 
countries which suppUed the sacred writers with illus- 
trations, freely use water. There, it is indeed necessary 
to their health and life. Hence it was that a man one 
day saw a flock approaching the well where he sat way- 
worn and weary, in a dry parched land, beneath a burn- 
ing sun. A common sight that; but not so the guar- 
dians of this flock — a sight as beautiful as infrequent, 
seven shepherdesses ; sisters all ; in the bloom of youth 
and womanhood. Hand in hand, with arms around 
each other's necks, these fair ones approach, perhaps un- 
aware of a stranger's presence ; and, drawing, fill the 
troughs that were there, to water their father's sheep. 
But ere this was done, some men, for the wells of the 
East were often common property, arrived with their 
flocks at the same place for the same purpose ; and with 
more of the selfishness of human nature than the courtesy 
we are accustomed to associate with Eastern manners, 
they took unmanly advantage of their superior strength 
to drive the maidens and their flock aside — an act of 
rudeness, and of plain injustice also, since not they but 
the shepherdesses had filled the troughs. A banished 
man, with a price set on his head, and his thoughts far 
away in the land where his friends and people wore 
the chains of a galling slavery, the stranger was probably 
too much occupied with his own sad reflections to take, 
in the first instance, much interest in the scene. But 
this rude injustice and oppression rouses a lion within 
him : and though it was against great odds — he a 
foreigner ^n^. the shepherds natives— he one and they 



THE RECHABITES. 341 



many — Moses, for it is he, steps forward ; and with that 
in his eye, his tones, and bearing that makes the cowards 
quail and retreat as he advances, he espouses the cause 
of the weaker party — and rights their wrongs. Fain, 
but perhaps too modest to ask him to their home, hi 
fair cHents content themselves with kind looks and 
grateful thanks. But full of admiration of his gallant 
bearing, they relate the whole affair to their father, who 
instantly sends them back, no unwilling messengers, to 
invite the stranger to the house — where, conducted by 
his future wife and her fair train of sisters, Moses found 
a home. It is to this same house, where he spent forty 
happy years, that I proceed, to trace the remarkable 
family whose name stands at the head of this article. 

On seeing a girl tending a flock of sheep or herd of 
cattle, we might conclude that, though presenting with 
her golden locks, and rosy cheek, and naked feet, a 
beautiful picture, the nature of her occupation proved 
the humbleness of her rank. Such an inference would 
have been wrong in the old tim.es of Scripture. People 
had more true taste and less false shame in these early 
days. Laban, for example, was a man of wealth, yet on 
our first introduction to his daughter, Jacob's future and 
favourite wife, we find her engaged in the care of her 
father's flock. " Behold," said the shepherds, speaking 
of Laban, and directing Jacob's attention to a beautiful 
maiden who approached them, "Behold, Rachel his 
daughter cometh with the sheep ! " But the head of the 
house ro which Moses was conducted, the father of these 
fair shepherdesses, held a position much superior to 



34S THE RECHABITES. 



Laban's. Reuel, or Jethro, or Hobab, for he goes by 
all the three names, appears to have united in himself 
both the offices of a priest and of a prince in the land 
of Midian : and thereby affords us a curious and inte- 
resting glimpse into the arrangements of society in the 
patriarchal age. It is probable that at that early period, 
and among those who, preserving the primitive faith, 
worshipped one true God, there was no class specially 
set apart for religious offices — such as the Jews, under 
the Mosaic dispensation, had in their priests, and we, 
and all Christian sects, with a few exceptions, have in 
those called ministers, or clergy. Abraham, for instance, 
offered sacrifices simply as the head of a family ; so did 
Jacob j and where there was a clan or tribe, the honour 
and responsibility of discharging such sacred functions 
belonged probably to its chief, who, after a fashion, 
united Church and State. Melchizedec did so. He 
was King of Salem, and also a priest of the Most High 
God ; being honoured and recognised as such on account 
of his pre-eminent piety throughout the whole land, and 
by many besides his own subjects, Moses' father-in-law 
seems to have occupied a similar position. On visiting 
the Israelites in the wilderness, he offered sacrifice ; and 
in taking part with him in that holy office, Aaron and 
the elders of Israel virtually acknowledged what might 
be called his " holy orders." Moses, his son-in-law, the 
renowned leader of the Hebrew host, himself inspired of 
God and endowed by nature with the highest qualities of 
a statesman, paid Jethro yet higher honours — taking 
counsel of him, and following his advice as how best 



THE RECHABITES. 343 



to lighten the burdens of government, dispense justice 
to the people, and guide the helm of the Common- 
wealth. 

This distinguished man was the ancestor of the Re- 
chabites — a fact which can be plainly made out by 
bringing together some scattered parts of Scripture 
history. It is true that Jethro, though he visited 
Israel on their approaching his territories during their 
march through the wilderness, and on that occasion 
restored his wife and two sons to Moses, did not abide 
with them ; but, taking his departure, bade them fare- 
well, and " went his way into his own land." A branch 
of his family, however, who were called Kenites, after- 
wards joined themselves to the Hebrew nation, and 
being received into its bosom, became partakers of its 
privileges — an event which is thus recorded in the first 
chapter of the book of Joshua : — "And the children of 
the Kenite, Moses' father-in-law, went up out of the city 
of palm-trees with the children of Judah into the wilder- 
ness of Judah, which lieth in the south of Arad : and 
they went and dwelt among the people." Now the 
Kenites, being the descendants of Jethro, all that is 
required to prove that he was the ancestor of the Re- 
chabites is to show their identity with these Kenites, and 
this is done in the last verse of the second chapter of 
I Chronicles, where it is said, " These are the Kenites 
that came of Hemath, the father of the house of 
Rechab." 

I have thus traced the stream to its fountain. Sprimg 
from Jethro, the Rechabites had a noble origin; and 



344 THE RECHABITES. 



since it is sometimes with men, as it always is with 
water, that they rise to the height of the fountain from 
which they spring, this tribe may have owed somewhat 
of their superior virtues to their honourable descent 
That those who are born of families distinguished for 
talents and virtue often possess superior properties, is a 
well-known fact ; one recorded in such proverbial ex- 
pressions as these, " A hawk out of a good nest," " An 
ounce of blood is better than a pound of bone." If 
there is so much, as is known to shepherds and sports- 
men, in the breed of dogs and horses, much more may 
we attach value to the breed of men, among whom we 
often see the qualities of the heart and head descending, 
by a law more sure than that of entail, from sire to son 
through succeeding generations. How much of their 
noble character the Rechabites owed to their noble 
descent, it were not easy to tell. But they were under 
the favourable influences which the connection with old 
and honourable families naturally exerts on the minds of 
their representatives. Such families are more than merely 
ornamental to a country, like the old and picturesque 
castles they inhabit. The deeds which won fame and 
fortune for the founder of the house, the hoary traditions 
of its past history, the memory of a long line of distin- 
g"uished ancestors — famous in public annals for their 
patriotism, and in the country around for their generous 
and noble charities, the feeling of having to maintain the 
high character of an ancient house, these things do, and 
cannot fail to exert influences for good which are not 
felt by families that, growing and perhaps destined to 



THE RECHABITES. 34S 



decay like mushrooms, sprung up but yesterday, with- 
out any ancestral traditions to cherish or ancestral 
honours to maintain. - 

THE PECULIAR CUSTOMS WHICH THE RECHABITES PRACTISED. 

For a long period after being adopted into the family 
of Israel, those descendants of Jethro who bore the name 
of Kenites achieved no distinction : but passed through 
life like the great mass who eat and drink, marry and 
give in marriage, get quietly, and many of them usefully, 
through their duties, and then die off; and, with their me- 
mories consigned to the same tomb as their bodies, find 
no place in story. There was, indeed, one remarkable 
exception to this, Jael the wife of Heber — she who slew 
Sisera, the leader of the hosts of Canaan, having enticed 
him into her tent, and when he slept, with a nail driven 
through his temples, pinned him dead to the ground. 
Approve or condemn the part this heroine played in this 
bloody drama — and for myself I am not prepared either 
wholly to applaud or wholly to censure her — Heber's 
wife did a deed that earned for her the thanks of a grate- 
ful country, and a place in immortal song. Long years 
after, on festive and solemn occasions, in cottages where 
women plied the distaff, and in camps where soldiers 
met, of her, the pride of her own sex and the envy of the 
other, they sung, " Blessed above women shall Jael the 
wife of Heber the Kenite be, blessed shall she be above 
women in the tent. He asked water, and she gave him 
milk ; she brought forth butter in a lordly dish. She put 
her hand to the nail, and her right hand to the work- 



34^ THE RECHABITES, 



men's hammer ; and with the hammer she smote Sisera, 
she smote off his head, when she had pierced and 
stricken through his temples. At her feet he bowed, he 
fell, hg lay down : . . . . where he bowed, there he fell 
down dead." 

Jael passes away; and long centuries thereafter 
another Kenite, equally distinguished for decision of 
character, steps on the stage. It is Jonadab the son of 
Rechab ; and the star of the Kenite is once more in the 
ascendant. To such a height had his patriotism, and 
probably his piety, raised this man in public esteem, that 
Jehu, the executioner of God's wrath on the house of 
Ahab, courted his favour. Some men's favour is sun- 
shine to a cause — their mere presence ensures success — 
and the highest testimony to Jonadab's influence is the 
anxiety Jehu shows to enlist him on his side, and to 
Jonadab's piety is the argument Jehu urges : " Come," 
he says, cloaking, as others have done, selfish ends 
under the appearance of religion, " Come, see my zeal 
for the Lord ! " 

There are some who, through the good influences they 
have exerted, live long after they are dead. It is said of 
those who die in the Lord that their works do follow 
them — but while their good works follow them to heaven, 
they also remain behind them on earth. Indeed, every- 
one, though only within the walls of a humble cottage? 
or the narrow limits of a country village, has an influence 
for good or evil — pebbles as well as rocks, when they 
fall into a lake, raising circles on its glassy surface ; and 
it is a solemn thing to think that no man lives, or can 



THE RECHABITES. 347 



live to himself, without affecting some for weal or woe. 
Bat from time to time, once in a century or so — as might 
be expected in a world where Nature, though producing 
many mice, produces but one elephant, at a birth — great 
men arise to stamp their character on their age and 
nation, — by their thoughts, the principles they enunciate, 
the institutions they establish, forming the minds and 
ruling the destinies of generations that walk above their 
graves. Such men England had in Latimer and Ridley, 
in the Puritans of a succeeding age, and in those bold 
Barons of an earlier era who wrung her Magna Charta 
from tyrant hands. Such a man Scotland had in Knox, 
whose grave, like his who also led forth a nation from the 
House of Bondage, is known to none, but whose life is 
felt and whose memory is honoured by his countrymen — 
to whatever shores their energy and education have 
carried them. Among these moulders of men and 
makers of public opinion the son of Rechab holds no 
mean place. No man ever stamped his own features 
more deeply on the mind of others. With a more 
enduring impression than can be made on iron or on 
granite, his descendants took their cast and character 
from him ; religiously observing for three hundred years 
at least, and for how many more I know not, the two 
customs he imposed on them — a nomade life and absti- 
nence from all intoxicating drinks. 

The instructions of Jonadab to his children, in con- 
formity to which, since example is better than precept, he 
probably shaped his own practice, were these, as recorded 
in the thirty-fifth chapter of Jeremiah ; " We will drink no 



348 THE RECHABITES. 



wine," said his tribe, " for Jonadab the son of Rechab our 
father commanded us, saying, Ye shall drink no wine, 
neither ye, nor your sons, for ever : neither shall ye build 
house, nor sow seed, nor plant vineyard, nor have any : 
but all your days ye shall dwell in tents." Thus sted- 
fastly adhering to a practice which the founder of their 
house had enjoined, and age had made venerable in their 
eyes, the Rechabites answered Jeremiah, pushing away 
the cup he offered. Though not without God's sanction, 
and indeed in obedience to his express directions, the 
prophet had put these stout men and their stem prin- 
ciples to no ordinary test. It was in the very temple 
and house of God the wine was offered. It was poured 
out by the hand of one of his most pious servants. He 
was ? prophet of the Most High God who invited them 
to drmk — wnat, apart from the prohibition of Jonadab, 
they probably had no objection to use. How natural in 
these circumstances for them to say — That cannot be 
forbidden which is offered in holy vessels, nor wrong to 
which a prophet invites ! Yet they put aside the cup, 
saying, " We have obeyed the voice of Jonadab the son 
of Rechab our father in all that he hath charged us, to 
drink no wine all our days, we, our wives, our sons, nor 
our daughters." Happy family ! — of how few, it any, of 
ours could it be said ? — in which for three hundred years 
there had never been a drunkard to break a mother's 
heart, to bring shame on those who loved him, to fill a 
dishonoured grave ? Such was Jonadab's — and such how 
many sad mourners wish that theirs had been ! How- 
ever people may, or may no^, think it duty to set the 



THE RECHABITES, 349 



example, and rear their children up in the customs of the 
Rechabites, they cannot but admit and admire the wis- 
dom of this man. Holding prevention to be better than 
cme, and that, as all experience proves, it is much easier 
to keep people out of temptation than save them in it, 
Jonadab, while enjoining his descendants to drink no 
wine, seeks to protect them from temptation ; forbidding 
them, though they might have used the fruit of the vine 
in many other ways than drink, to plant a vineyard. 
Following his example, and for the same end, not a few 
parents educate their families in habits of the strictest 
temperance, in the use of no cup stronger than that 

Which cheers, but not inebriates. 

Christians may differ as to the path of duty in that 
matter. But the general lesson which Jonadab's injunc- 
tion teaches is one, the truth and importance of which 
none will question. Peace of conscience and purity of 
life turn much more on our avoiding than resisting temp- 
tations. It is wiser, if it be possible, to flee than to fight 
them : a great truth taught us by a higher authority than 
Jonadab. It stands embodied in the Lord's Prayer, in 
that, not the least important of its petitions. Lead us not 
into temptation ! 

The second injunction of Jonadab was no less faithfully 
observed by his posterity. Types of man on this earth, 
and true representatives of Abraham — from whose loins 
they sprung, through Keturah, his second wife — they 
were strangers and sojourners in the land. Camping 
among the hills or grassy plains of Judah, they lived a 



35© THE RECHABITES. 



wandering life : a shepherd race, who moved about from 
pasture to pasture with the flocks that formed their 
wealth ; neither enervated by the luxuries, nor corrupted 
by the vices of cities. Virtuous in their habits, they were 
simple in their manners. Yet shrewd withal : quite able, 
which many are not, to hold fast their principles without 
riding them to the death. For example, notwithstanding 
their ancient customs, and the commandment of Jona- 
dab, and their respect for his authority, they abandoned 
their tents ; and fleeing the open country, took refuge 
within Jerusalem when the Chaldeans invaded the land. 
God's laws admit of no exceptions. But, neither bigots 
nor fanatics, the Rechabites rightly judged that man's 
do j and, as they were ready to dwell in houses when it 
would have been death to dwell in tents, they would have 
been equally ready, I have no doubt, to violate in the letter, 
though not in the spirit, the other law of Jonadab — to 
drink wine in a case of clear necessity, where its use was 
judged indispensable to the preservation of health or 
life. 

As to the history of these two remarkable customs, it 
was probably the dissolute manners of his age which in- 
duced Jonadab to institute them. Considerations of 
expediency may make that a duty at one time which is 
not so at another. Medicine — to take an illustration 
from it — is not meat, yet the body is often in such an ab- 
normal condition, so unhealthy, as to require its use ; 
and, when the air is charged with the subtle poison of 
disease, precautions which were superfluous in happier 
times are necessary to fortify us against its attacks. Such 



THE RECHABTTES. 35? 



were, perhaps, the grounds on which the son of Rechah 
acted. A sagacious and patriotic man, he probably in- 
stituted these customs to protect his family and their 
descendants from the general corruption of the age — the 
vices that reigned in cities, and the drunkenness that, 
prevailing everywhere, was undermining the prosperity 
and happiness, the health and lives of thousands. The 
principle on which he acted may be misapplied, yet the 
Bible sanctions and enforces it ; saying. Go thou and do 
likewise. Looking to the good of others, the glory of 
God, and the interests of the Redeemer's kingdom, Paul 
says — and the apostle's is a statement that admits of a 
wide application — All things are lawful for me, but all 
things are not expedient. 

THE BLESSING ENJOYED BY THE RECHABITES. 

There are few, if any, estates in our country now in 
possession of the direct, lineal male descendants of those 
who owned them three hundred years ago. Old families 
die out ; their properties pass into the hands of aliens, or 
of collateral heirs ; and whether it is a royal palace, or a 
noble's castle, or a simple mansion-house, the place that 
once knew them knows them no more. But for three 
whole centuries Jonadab the son of Rechab never wanted 
a man to stand up before the Lord. His descendants 
had seen successive d3Tiasties on the throne ; ancient 
houses, crushed by misfortune, crumble into ruins; 
honourable families sink into mean obscurity ; and many 
perish altogether in the course of time, and under the 
ravages of disease and wars. However, the changes 



J5* THE RECHABITES. 



that swept away these had but swept over them, as the 
waves over a rock which, so soon as they have burst, 
emerges firm and fixed from the cloud of spray. A 
remarkable result, certainly, and one which becomes 
remarkably instructive when we look to its causes. 
These belong both to Heaven and earth; in other 
words, this result is due both to the Divine blessing and 
to the action of certain natural agents. 

First, their wandering habits, their life passed in the 
open country and in tents, was calculated to preserve 
and prolong the existence of this family. No mode of life 
is perhaps so accordant with our natural instincts as was 
theirs. It offered, as they roamed from pasture to pasture, 
constant change of scenery, and in that the greatest plea- 
sure of travelling — a balm to grief, a perpetual feast to 
man's love of novelty, and an innocent stimulant of equal 
advantage to mind and body. How strong the attrac- 
tions of such a life are admits of many illustrations. Let 
me adduce two — the one a curse, the other a fact. 
The curse is one employed by the Tartars, themselves 
nomades, a wandering shepherd race. The only one, 
indeed, they are accustomed to use, it proves how much 
people reared to a roaming life come to love it, and how 
miserable they think any other — the direst wish which 
a Tartar pronounces against his enemy being, May you 
live in one place, and work like a Russian ! And the fact 
that proves the charms of such a life is the all but in- 
superable difiiculty of weaning gipsies and other such 
wanderers from their old habits, notwithstanding the 
extreme hardships they entail in our uncertain climate. 



THE RECHABITES, 353 



I knew a boy, for instance, belonging to this race, whom 
his parents had been induced to leave with a kind, 
Christian family, under whose roof he enjoyed many ad- 
vantages — a comfortable home, good and regular meals, 
instruction in letters and in habits of honest industry. Yet, 
notwithstanding these, and after being to appearance 
tamed, so strong were the charms of his old life that he 
seized the first opportunity of returning to it, like the 
young chamois which a shepherd of the Alps caught, and, 
hanging a bell from its neck, reared with his goats. It 
seemed to be quite domesticated ; going and returning 
with the herd, till a day when it happened to hear the 
cry of its old wild race amid the mountain rocks. The 
creature started, and listened. For some moments it 
stood in an attitude of eager attention, trembling with 
intense excitement ; and then, all of a sudden bounding 
from the meadow, it sprung into the cliff, and leaping 
from crag to crag, vanished among the heights where it 
joined its kindred, and was never more seen ; though for 
years thereafter its bell was often heard tinkling among 
the rocks, and the mists that shrouded them. 

The most consonant, as it thus appears, a wandering 
life is to our natural instincts, it is on that and many 
other accounts the most conducive to good health, and 
long life, and the permanent existence of such families as 
practise it — at least in a climate so fine and under cir- 
cumstances so favourable as those of the Rechabites 
were. Towns have many advantages ; and who would 
find the highest types of man, intellectually, morally, or 
spiritually, must seek them among citizens. Yet through 

A A 



354 THE RECHABITES. 



their luxurious and unnatural habits of life, the wear and 
tear and turmoil of business, their vitiated air, and espe- 
cially their vices, towns are great devourers of human 
life. They waste it ; nor, as statistics prove, could large 
cities increase, or even keep up their numbers, without 
a constant immigration from rural districts. Men get 
dwarfed, dwindle away, and die, more or less like many 
trees, amid the smoke of towns ; and there can be no 
doubt that the tented life and roaming habits of the 
Rechabites, under the genial skies and amid the pleasant 
scenes of Palestine, materially contributed, under the 
blessing of God, to preserve their race. 

But, secondly, there can be as little doubt that their 
habits of temperance, carried to the extent of what is 
called Total Abstinence, so far as natural causes were 
considered, contributed also, and still more, to the same 
result. It is certain that the strongest man the world 
has seen drank nothing stronger than water. His cup 
was filled at the crystal spring; and it was water, not 
wine, the bloody jaw-bone yielded to restore his strength. 
Though Samson's was undoubtedly a case out of the 
common course of nature, he may have owed his strength 
in some measure to his abstinence. It is a well-esta- 
blished fact, at any rate, that the ancient athletes, as do 
their modern successors who engage in pedestrian, 
wrestling, fighting feats, rigorously abstained from the use 
of stimulants ; regarding them as not fitted to increase, 
but to impair their strength. And whatever reasons 
people may find for the use of these, there is no doubt 
that the simpler our fare, if nutritious, the better — those 



THE RECHABITES. 355 



having most chance of enjoying robust health, long life, 
and a green old age, who follow the habits of the Re- 
chabites, and abjure all intoxicants. I could prove 
that ; but that needs no proof which the highest medica! 
authorities affirm, and no well-informed, impartial man 
attempts now-a-days to deny. Thus in those customs 
which distinguished the descendants of Rechab from 
others, we find two causes that help to account for the 
fact that while other families perished from the face of 
the earth, they endured — evergreen and immortal in their 
virtues ; flourishing amid the nation's decay ; defpng 
alike all changes of fortune, the ravages of disease, and 
the arm of death, to extirpate and extinguish them. 

I see more, however, in the story of the Rechabites 
than a testimony to the advantages of simple manners 
and sober habits, in favour of what an eminent medical 
authority called the three great physicians, namely. Air, 
Exercise, and Water. It was not the material or moral 
advantages which they found in these simple and tem- 
perate habits — though they might have urged these — 
which they gave to Jeremiah as their reasons for de- 
clining his invitation. " We will drink no wine," they 
said. And why ? They did not say. Because we think 
it a sin; nor because we, who do not use it, enjoy 
robuster health, longer lives, clearer heads, lighter hearts 
and heavier purses than those who do ; nor because we 
stand in fear that our example might lead some to use 
wine who would not or could not do so without abusing 
it. The simple ground on which they placed their re- 
fusal was the respect they felt and the obedience they 

A A 2 



35^ THE RECHABITES. 



owed to parental authority. They say, *'for Jonadab the 
son of Rechab our father commanded us ; " and again, 
** Thus have we obeyed the voice of Jonadab the son of 
Rechab in all that he hath charged us." It was iM this 
account that they, on the one hand, preserved the custom 
of their ancestors, and on this account also, on the other 
hand, that God preserved them — saying, by the mouth 
of Jeremiah, " Thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of 
Israel ; Because ye have obeyed the commandment of 
Jonadab your father, and kept all his precepts, and done 
according unto all that he hath commanded you : there- 
fore thus saith the Lord of hosts, the God of Israel ; 
Jonadab the son of Rechab shall not want a man to 
stand before me for ever." 

It is a dull ear which does not catch in these words 
an echo, as from the rocks of Sinai, of the command- 
ment, " Honour thy father and thy mother, that thy 
days may be long upon the land which the Lord thy 
God giveth thee." Eminent examples of filial piety, 
how might that law have been inscribed, as their appro- 
priate motto, on the banners of the house of Rechab? 
Living in remarkable accordance with its precept, they 
were a remarkable monument to the truth of its promise. 
Distinguished from all around them by their superior 
respect for parental authority, they were equally distin- 
guished by their happier fortune ; while others perished, 
their days were long upon the land which the Lord their 
God had given them. That law is one of the Ten which, 
written by God's own finger, and spoken in thunder tones 
by his own awfiil voice, were separated and distinguished 



THE RECHABITES. 357 



from those Mosaic ordinances, the shadows of good 
things to come, that were buried in the grave of Christ. 
Like the other nine it was fulfilled, not interred, by the 
Redeemer. Like all other parts of the Decalogue, it is 
of permanent authority ; and God is still making good 
its promise in the well-doing, the health and wealth and 
prosperity of thousands who honoured their parents how- 
ever humble they might be, cherished them, and yielded 
to father and mother the reverence that was their due. 

"My son," says Solomon, "hear the instruction of 
thy father, and forsake not the law of thy mother : for 
they shall be an ornament of grace unto thy head, and 
chains about thy neck." No man ever found himself 
the worse for taking that advice, nor is there a circle 
however limited but can show cases illustrative of the 
blessing that follows honour paid to father and mother. 
But, leaving these, let me adduce an example of this on 
a scale of no ordinary grandeur. There is a nation 
which numbers both more people and more years than 
any other on earth, ancient or modern, dead or living. 
The Chinese— for of them I speak — can trace their 
national existence to a period not far removed from the 
days of Noah. They appear in the dawn of history and 
earliest ages of antiquity ; cultivating the arts when our 
forefathers, and those of all other existing nations, were 
barbarians. Unchanged amid perpetual and universal 
change, they saw the Egyptian, Assyrian, Babylonian, 
Persian, Grecian, and Roman empires rise and fall, 
flourish and decay; and now, a teeming population, 
they this day cultivate the very fields their ancestor? 



35^ THE RECHABITES. 



ploughed when the story of the flood was fresh, and men, 
who heard it from the Hps of Noah or his sons, told how 
the windows of heaven and the fountains of the great 
deep were opened. Now, though Pagans, two peculiari- 
ties have distinguished the Chinese from other pagan 
nations. Unlike the Greeks, the natives of Hindoostan, 
the Romans, and other heathens, they, though practising 
vice, have never deified it ; and, secondly, they have 
placed reverence for parents, and obedience to their 
authority, at the head of all the virtues. When parents 
die their children even worship them ; and while they 
live, yield such blind submission to their will that there 
is hardly a crime a child will not commit at their bidding. 
Filial reverence, in fact, is the redeeming and prominent 
feature of their character — one that has distinguished 
them as much from the nations which they have seen 
grow up and perish, as the oval contour of their heads 
and oblique position of their eyes. The connection 
between a national virtue and a national vitality so re- 
markable, I cannot regard as altogether accidental — one 
of the curious coincidences that occasionally occur. Il- 
lustrating in their lives the precept, they also illustrate 
in their fortunes the promise, of the Fifth Command- 
ment; so that, from this nation, numerous above all 
others for its population, and venerable above all others 
for its hoar antiquity, I seem to hear the words God 
sounded forth from Sinai, " Honour thy father and thy 
mother, that thy days may be long upon the land which 
the Lord thy God giveth thee." 

As unquestionably illustrating and enforcing this com* 



THE RECIIABITES. 359 



mandment, the history of the Rechabites at any rate is 
at all times instructive, and in these times peculiarly 
seasonable. Our age has its peculiar features ; but re» 
verence for authority is certainly not one of them. In- 
deed it bodes ill for our country, and for the future 
fortunes of America especially, not that kings are no 
longer " hedged round with divinity," but that a father's 
word does not carry the weight, nor his presence com- 
mand the respect, which once belonged to them. The 
age is out of joint. Children are little men and little 
women. Whether it be due to a system of education 
that, like a hot-house, unduly forces the growth of 
youth, or to that early independence which children 
attain through the manufactures and machinery that 
yield them wages sufficient for their support, or to the 
operation of political and ecclesiastical causes ; whether 
it be due to one, or to another, or to all these influences 
combined, the tendency of this age is to throw off au- 
thority. Divine as well as human. The daring manner 
in which many treat sacred things — boldly intruding 
within the veil of the temple, sitting in presumptuous 
judgment on God's character, questioning his provi- 
dence, setting limits to his authority, handling his in- 
spired Word as they would the pages of a common 
history, and by their own little line measuring Him who 
hath measured out the heavens and laid the foundations 
of the earth, — these are the developments of a spirit which 
begins by disowning the authority of man, and ends by 
disowning that of God. When filial reverence is lost, 
and, despising the judgment of the wise and venerable, 



360 THE RECHABITES. 

men say, " Let us break their bonds, and cast their cords 
from us," it looks like the beginning of the end. The 
rent that goes through the hearth-stone has a tendency 
to extend itself into the foundations of all social order 
and true piety. Who does not reverence a father on 
earth is not likely to reverence our Father in heaven. 
Who does not love a mother will not love Jesus Christ. 
Let the subject be looked into, and I dare to say it will be 
found that there is a far closer connection than what lies 
in their being printed on the same page and embraced 
in the same verse, between the two great clauses of this 
beautiful commandment, Thou shalt rise up before the 
hoary head, and honour the face of an old man, and fear 
thy God, In the words of the hymn, 

A father's voice with reverence we 

On earth have often heard j 
The Father of our spirits now 

Demands the same regard. 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 



PART 1. 




URDER will out," is a common sa5ring, 
whereby people mean that though that 
crime is one seldom committed in the 
presence of witnesses, or to be proved otherwise than 
by circumstantial evidence, God takes special care to 
bring it to light, and such as commit it to justice. The 
fact that it has been often revealed in a very remarkable 
way is known to all. Many cases are on record where 
the finger of Providence seemed pointed at the murderer, 
and circumstances turned up which said, as plainly as 
the prophet Nathan, Thou art the man ! Indeed, one 
can hardly read a trial for murder without meeting some- 
thing in the evidence so strange, so unlooked-for, so 
unexpected, and yet so important for the ends of justice, 
as to impress us with a sense of a presiding Providence, 
and of there being more than a vulgar superstition in 
the saying, " Murder will out." Though they had no 
claims to be classed with the Causes Celebres, I myself 
have met with two cases of the kind. 



362 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

In one case the crime was committed by a wandering 
gipsy. He had killed his wife, in a lone corrie of the 
Grampians, counting, no doubt, that, buried below the 
winter snows, and bleached by the sun and wind and 
summer rains, the body, ere it was discovered, would be 
a withered skeleton — not to be recognised by the mother 
who bore it. Yet her blood was hardly dry on the 
heather, nor had the raven ventured from his perch on 
an oid mountain ash, where he sat whetting his beak 
and croaking over the corpse, when some smugglers, who 
were seeking to elude the revenue officers by taking the 
wildest bypaths over the hills, came on the body. Rough 
men, and not slack, if brought to bay, to make their 
bludgeons ring on the heads of the excise, they were 
horrified at the spectacle, and hastened to raise the alarm. 
Up rose the hue and cry ; and the body being recognised 
as that of a woman whom some had seen the day before 
lying on the hill-side in company with a man that others 
had met pushing on by himself for the low country, he 
became an object of suspicion, and also of an active 
pursuit. They traced him for miles down into Strath- 
more, and to a village inn where he had spent the night. 
Here, as when the hounds start a fox, and the whole 
pack, giving tongue as the prey breaks cover, set off at 
his heels, the people learned what, removing all doubt of 
their being on the right track and after the right man, 
quickened the pursuit. According to the landlady, he 
whom they had traced to her house, and who had left it 
but a few hours before, had conducted himself there in a 
strange, mysterious way. His bed-room was right above 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 363 

her own ; and, through the live-long night, depriving her 
of sleep, he had paced the floor overhead with heavy 
step — deep groans mingling from time to time with the 
tramp of his restless foot. Each of these steps was a 
step to the gallows. In the judgment of those who had 
taken up the pursuit they proved him the murderer as 
plainly as if they had left bloody footprints on the floor. 
Abandoning now all intention of giving up the chase, 
they resumed it with renewed vigour ; and in a few hours 
more the man was in the hands of justice, betrayed by 
the guilty horrors of his own conscience. However, as 
there were none there to identify him, and as he gave 
some feasible explanation of his suspicious behaviour in 
the inn, he was set free, but not to go off" like a shot 
from a gun, with the speed of one who, to use a common 
but expressive saying, " had rubbed shoulders with the 
gallows." For some hours the ruffian circled about the 
spot, as we have seen a moth in an autumn evening 
about the candle, till it plunges to perish in the flame. 
*' Murder will out." Contrary to what might reasonably 
have been expected of a man in his circumstances, like 
one stricken of God with a blind infatuation, he hovered 
about the place. He was again seized ; and afterwards 
was tried, condemned, and hanged. I saw him in the 
dock in Edinburgh ; and who that has seen, amid the 
awful silence of a crowded court, a man stand up, while 
his pale features work convulsively and his fingers 
clutch the bar, to hear his doom from the trembling voice 
of a fellow mortal, can forget a scene so awfully sugges- 
tive of the last great judgment, and the despair of those 



364 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

who, clinging to Christ's feet, are dragged away to ever- 
lasting punishment ! 

The other case was one connected with my old country 
parish. Though the respective rights of the heritors on 
the one hand, and the minister, or incumbent, on the 
other, over the church and churchyard are not very dis- 
tinctly defined, yet, where there is no interference on the 
part of the landed proprietors, who in Scotland are bound 
by law both to build and uphold all the ecclesiastical 
edifices, the control of the church and churchyard is 
vested in the minister. This in old times was expressed, 
not in words but in symbol, at his induction, when the 
keys of the parish church were publicly and formally 
committed to his hands. Therefore it was that one 
summer-day I had a visit from a sheriff's officer, or, as 
some of these officials are called, a " messenger-at-arm^s," 
who presented a warrant requiring me to allow a grave in 
the churchyard to be opened, and the body to be exhumed 
and examined. It was the grave of a woman who had 
resided elsewhere ; but, being a native of my parish, had 
been brought there to be buried, that, in conformity with 
a very old as well as common feeling, she might be 
gathered to her fathers — that her dust might mingle with 
that of her kindred. Since the funeral, which had taken 
place six weeks before, rumours had begun to float 
about that she had got foul play ; and her husband, to 
whom all the suspicions pointed, had been thrown into 
jail under the charge of murder. The officer, whose 
warrant, though shocked by the circumstances and sure 
that this meddling with the dead would greatly shock 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 365 

the people, I was ready to obey, was speedily followed 
by other officials and the doctors. They came prepared 
to examine the body for marks of violence or poison. 
The news flew like wild-fire through the quiet village 
beside which my manse, the church, and the churchyard 
stood. It was thrown into an uproar, the natural horror 
that people feel at disturbing the dead being much 
aggravated by the outrages which the resurrection men, 
as they were called — those who rifled graves at the 
dead of night to supply bodies for dissecting-rooms — 
were at that time committing on the tenderest feelings 
of humanity. I believe I incurred some odium by my 
willingness to aid in the investigation : at any rate, 
none else would furnish utensils or render any assistance 
— the few whose curiosity overcame their horror stand- 
ing far apart as we broke into the house of the dead. 
The only help obtained was the use of an old empty 
bam, without which indeed it would have been hardly 
possible to have examined the body. It was the height 
of summer ; the day was bright and hot ; and I re- 
member well, when the coffin was raised, and the lid 
forced open, how the whole air seemed instantly filled 
with a cloud of blow-flies that settled down in thick 
black swarms on the corpse. On the face-cloth being 
thrown back and the body unswathed, the spectacle 
was one, if anything short of divine grace could 
do it, to humble vanity and the pride of personal 
charms; nor shall I ever forget, as I stood at her 
feet looking on while one of the doctors, with mallet 
and chisel, was opening the skull, how the dead 



366 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

woman, as if she recognised me, nodded her head at 
every blow. 

On relating that he had gone to see a criminal die 
under the guillotine, and how he had watched the whole 
affair with an opera-glass, Lord Byron says it is well to 
see such things once : and, however repulsive the spec- 
tacle, when I have seen some pretty but vain, silly woman 
come vapouring with mincing steps and haughty air into 
the house of God, not to worship, but to be worshipped, I 
have thought it would be well that such people, for once 
at least, saw what they are to become. Nor am I sin- 
gular in that. It is told of an Italian friar, one of Rome's 
great Lent preachers — a class of men who often subdue 
their audience into tears, and by vivid descriptions of 
hell and purgatory throw women into fainting-fits and 
men into convulsions — that denouncing on one occasion 
" the lust of the eye and the pride of Hfe," he fixed his 
large, black, brilliant eyes on a proud beauty who sat 
before him, and drove the colour off her cheek. Taking 
a grinning skull from out the folds of his cloak, he sud- 
denly held it up before her face, to say, See what thou 
shalt be ! There is no sin in admiring beauty. Not the 
devil, but He gave it who made Eve lovelier, I believe, 
than the fairest of her daughters ; and, whether in the 
human face and form, or in beast, bird, and beetle, or in 
the flowers of the field and the gorgeous tints of the 
evening sky, gave it to be admired, gave it to minister to 
our happiness and pleasure. The sin lies in worshipping 
it, setting a too high value on it, feeling proud of pos- 
sessing it ! or, if a woman is plain, envying such as are 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 36? 

pretty, and feeling displeased with God for making us 
what we are. Such a sight as the secret of that grave 
disclosed was well calculated, with God's blessing, to 
abase vanity in the dust, mortify pride, and crucify the 
flesh with its affections and lusts. In that " chamber of 
horrors " how much to be preferred to a beauty which 
could turn into loathsomeness, to charms which the hand of 
death had so horribly defaced, appeared what the apostle 
calls " the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not 
corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit ; 
which is in the sight of God of great price." 

But there we saw something more shocking than the 
poor unlovely remains — evidences of death cruelly in- 
flicted by the very hand which, in other days, had held 
that cold hand, when pledges ot love were passed and 
vows were taken to be faithful " till separated by death." 
The viscera showed unmistakeable evidence of the pre- 
sence of arsenic — a substance which, unlike vegetable 
poisons, remains in the body to be, as lawyers say, a 
damning witness of crime ; and which also, being a pow- 
erful antiseptic, or corrective of putrefaction, actually 
preserves the body, whose life it destroys, to speak out 
at the bidding of the chemist, and convict the murderer 
of his crime. In many cases of murder, and especially 
in those where arsenic is administered, the proverb is not 
true — "Dead men tell no tales." Murder will out, I 
said to myself, as the knife laid bare another and another 
red patch on the organs of digestion, betraying the action 
of a deadly poison. But the truth came out sooner than 
we expected ; and more clearly than might possibly have 



368 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

been the result of a chemical analysis. While we were 
examining the body, the husband was otherwise occupied. 
Left in his lonely cell, to the worst of company — a guilty 
conscience, he had taken alarm on hearing that doctors 
and officers of justice had gone to exhume and examine 
the body of his wife. There was nothing remarkable 
in the circumstance that I should have been the last 
preacher he had heard, but it was a remarkable coin- 
cidence that my text on that occasion should have 
been so ominous of his fate, and appropriate to his 
case. Unknown to preachers, God may often be direct- 
ing them when they take an arrow at random from the 
quiver and draw the bow at a venture in the pulpit. 
Whether I shook the sense of security he had been 
entertaining that, as his victim had been now six weeks 
in the grave, the fatal secret was safely buried with her 
till the day of doom, or whether I had roused a sleep- 
ing conscience and made a coward of him, I know 
not; but, curious coincidence, to say the least, my 
text was the words with which the first murderer sought, 
but vainly, to hide his crime : these, to wit, " Am I 
my brother's keeper?" On their return, the doctors 
and law-officers found themselves saved all further trouble. 
There was no need for the first analyzing the contents 
of the bottles in which they had carried off portions 
of the body, nor for the second collecting evidence and 
preparing a case for the crown. The man was found 
dead in his cell. He had anticipated the executioner : had 
cheated the gallows, as they say — by hanging himself. 
Judas-like, he precipitated his fate; and, adding the 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 36^ 

crime of suicide to that of murder, was found hanging 
there, a proof that " Murder will out," and an awful 
evidence also of the Scripture truth, " The ways of 
transgressors are hard." 

Such cases are calculated to produce a sense of a pre- 
siding Providence on all minds, but especially on those 
of the common people, who, as in the days when they 
heard Jesus gladly, though less learned, often form sounder 
opinions on moral and religious subjects than those called 
their "betters." And it was to the deep and solemn 
feeling produced by such cases, and which, in the common 
people, as appeared on the occasion I am about to refer to, 
may be more or less tinged with superstition, that I owed 
a visit, paid me late in a November afternoon, when 
residing for some time in a part of the country which I 
had visited years before. The person who waited on me 
had left the death-bed of an old woman in a cottage in 
the neighbourhood ; and knowing that I was a minister 
of the gospel, she came to ask me to return with her. 
It was a peculiar, and in her judgment as well as in that 
of some others who kindly watched with her, also a 
"frightsome" and mysterious one. She had stood by 
many a dying bed, but never by one like it. The woman 
was dying, and yet could not die ; nor, impatient and 
wearied of the long struggle, could succeed in putting 
an end to herself — though, awful to relate, they ha i more 
than once detected her attempting it. The closing scene, 
which usually occupies two or three hours, before the 
curtain falls and all is over, had been prolonged in her 
case over as many days j and seemed no nearer an end 

B B 



37© UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

than ever. At first astonished, then puzzled and per- 
plexed, she and other two women who watched with hei 
had at length got frightened. The case was by common ; 
and they had no other explanation of it to offer but the 
conviction which had taken strong possession of them, 
that this old dying woman had an awful load of guilt 
upon her conscience, and that, having in bygone days 
committed some of those great crimes which God brings 
to light in unexpected ways, she was not to be allowed 
to die till she confessed her guilt — making good the old 
adage that *' Murder will out." 

It happened, as will appear in the course of the narra- 
tive, that I had become acquainted with the person whose 
strange mode of dying had given birth to such horrible 
suspicions, long years before this time : having known 
her when I was a boy, and renewed my acquaintance 
with her afterwards under circumstances of which I had 
a vivid and painful recollection. She had met with her 
full share of misfortunes, and was dying in much poorer 
circumstances than once she lived in. But, judging from 
her state of mind the last time we met, calamity had done 
as little to humble her haughty heart as age to bend her 
erect and imposing figure. When she lost her property, 
she retained all her pride ; and, though it was beautifully 
lighted up when she smiled, it was easy for one quite 
ignorant of physiognomy to discover in her face, its firm 
mouth and strongly marked lines of determination, and 
in those grey eyes that sometimes flashed from under 
their shaggy eyebrows, evidences of an iron will as well 
as of a fiery temper. Like a lonely tree, the hoar and 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. yj\ 

aged remnant of an ancient forest, she had outlived all 
her early companions : having survived to see succeeding 
generations, and among them all her children but one, of 
whom more afterwards, borne to the grave. But no 
early criminality, so far as I had heard, ever attached 
itself to her name ; yet I knew enough of her to believe 
that she would have stuck at almost nothing rather than 
brook public shame; and that, presented with a powerful 
temptation, she was capable of proving one of those, 
happily rare, women who have nerve for deeds that most 
men are too great cowards to attempt — whom Shakspeare 
represents in the Lady Macbeth of his drama, whom Scot- 
land in our day produced in Miss , and England in 

Mrs. Manning, sitting brisk and lively at the tea-table, 
with her feet resting on the hearth-stone below which lay 
the still fresh and bloody form of the paramour she had 
murdered and buried there. The truth is, that while 
both men and women stand in continual need of the 
constraining and restraining grace of God, women make 
more profit of it, and suffer greater loss by the want of 
it than men. As the sweetest wines turn into the sourest 
vinegars and the hottest climates develope in plants 
and animals the most deadly poisons, so women, with 
their warm impulses and impassioned tempers, when 
they become bad, become very bad. In the hands of 
the Spirit of God, as witness the group by the Cross, 
they grow into the bravest and most beautiful saints ; 
while in the hands of the devil, as witness Jezebel, and 
Athaliah, and Herodias' mother, they appear perfect 
fiends — in fact we could not describe them better than 

2 B 3 



^2 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

in the words which describe the prophet's figs, " The 
good are very good ; the bad are so bad that they can- 
not be eaten." 

However that may be, and whatever this poor woman 
might once have been capable of doing or been left to 
do, I was unwilling, even though I had been superstitious 
enough to be able, to entertain the suspicions which her 
strange death-bed had produced in others. Hoping to 
smooth the thorns of a dying pillow, to guide aright the 
steps of one who was struggling so hard to get through 
the dark valley, I agreed to my visitor's request, and 
soon followed her — but by a short bye-road through a 
ravine, where I thought I could trust myself to find the 
way. The period of the year and the scene were in 
unison with my feelings as I set out on this melancholy 
errand. The year was drawing to its close. The day 
itself was dying, fast sinking into darkness. There was 
hardly light enough to see the footpath which followed 
the wanderings of a winding stream, that now lost itself 
under over-hanging banks, and now flashed out, reflect- 
ing in its quiet pools the last lights of evening. The 
white stones that stood up among the rank grass of an 
old burying-ground which I had to pass, presented in 
the dim light of the gloamirC a weird and spectral look. 
The shattered towers and gables of an old feudal castle 
looked grimly down from the summit of a neighbouring 
rock ; turning my thoughts on the brave lords and gay 
ladies who had long left them to moulder to dust in the 
quiet grave-yard below, and recalling to memory these 
quaint lines : — 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 373 

The knights are dust, 
Their swords are rust, 
Their souls are with the saints we trust 

Thickly strewed with withered leaves that rustled and 
crackled under my feet, the pathway itself was associated 
with solemn thoughts of mortality ; and as the night wind 
sighed and groaned among the naked branches, and the 
sea came moaning from the bar which the stream had 
thrown up at its mouth, I felt in a mood to think that it 
was Nature mourning over the sufferings of her children — 
the voice of one that, according to the words of Scrip- 
ture, "groaneth and travaileth together in pain until 
now." 

A little while, and I had found my way to the cottage 
door ; but the scenes I saw, and the lessons I learned 
there, must be left to form the subject of another paper. 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

PART II. 

Fear not snow-drift driving fast. 
Sleet, or hail, or levin blast ; 
Soon the shroud shall lap thee fas^ 
And the sleep be on thee cast 

That shall ne'er know waking. 

Haste thee, haste thee, to be gone : 
Earth flits fast, and time draws on,— 
Gasp thy gasp, and groan thy groan. 
Day is near the breaking. 

HE cottage, to resume my tale, which I at length 
reached — and where they who watched a dying 
bed muttered to each other, " She cannot pass 
away with that on her mind, it tethers her here " — like 
others of the same class, was thatched with straw. On each 
side of the door stood a window, the lower panes of which 
were filled with wood instead of glass ; an arrangement 
which an Englishman, who gives an account of his travels 
in Scotland early in the seventeenth century, mentions 
as common not only in the best houses of Edinburgh at 
that period, but in Holyrood Palace itsel£ These 




UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 375 

wooden panes indicated something else than Scotch 
poverty. Hung on hinges, they admitted of being 
opened ; an arrangement that explains a line in an old 
popular song, and was well adapted for sanitary purposes. 
How often have I wished for them when breathing the 
foul, pestilential air of Edinburgh's Cowgate and Grass- 
market tenements ! — the loss of Hght they caused being 
more than compensated by the free admission they gave 
to the fresh breath of heaven. The cottage of the woman 
to whose strange death-bed I had been summoned, con- 
sisted of two apartments, called the but and the ben, and 
a small closet. The first was that in daily use, where 
the household work was done, the family ate as well as 
prepared their meals, and also slept, till it grew so large 
as to overflow into the ben. That, the best-furnished 
of the two, sometimes boasting a chest of drawers, 
poHshed chairs, and an eight-day clock, was commonly 
reserved for the accommodation of visitors, and for great 
occasions — festive meetings, baptisms, marriages, and such 
like. The floor of the but was clay : its fire-place an open 
one, where the fuel, chiefly peat, or furze, or logs of wood, 
burned on the hearth-stone, while the smoke, though 
partly straying into the room, where it hung in dun 
folds and coated the bare rafters with a black, lustrous 
varnish, went curling up a chimney so spacious that you 
could sit with your feet at the fire, and study the stars 
overhead. These dwellings were simply, perhaps I 
should say, often meanly furnished. Yet, the abodes 
of an educated, shrewd, and pious peasantry, there were 
few of them but had one or two shelves for books, where, 



376 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN, 

besides the Bibles and catechisms of the family, you 
would find Boston's " Fourfold State," Ambrose's " Look- 
ing unto Jesus," Willison's " Sacramental Meditations," 
a volume or two of John Owen ; and along with them 
some old ballads, perhaps a cheap geographical dic- 
tionary, and a few other books of secular knowledge. 

As calculated to increase the interest which, in these 
days, is felt in the Waldensian Church of Italy, that 
poorest, smallest, yet oldest true Church in Christen- 
dom, I may mention that I was often pleasantly re- 
minded of this feature of the old Scotch peasantry 
during a visit I lately paid to its mountain homes. 
Take, for example, a cottage in one of its highest and 
wildest valleys. It was the home of one of the poor 
peasant proprietors, and stood near the celebrated rock 
of the Balsille, where Henri Arnaud, at the head of 
seven hundred gallant men, defied for six long, weary, 
wintry months the armies of France and Savoy — against 
these emissaries of Papal Rome, holding up a banner for 
the truth, and achieving prodigies of valour. My readers 
must understand that, though in " Sunny Italy," the in- 
habitants of these valleys have to face the storms and 
endure many of the rigours of an arctic winter ; hardships 
greatly aggravated by their scanty stores both of food and 
fiiel. AVood abounds in their noble forests; but the 
labour required to cultivate their patches of soil away 
up among the precipices, and on the steep slopes of the 
snow-crowned mountains, is such as to leave them little 
time to lay in a stock of fuel. Hence, half the inhabi- 
tants of the parish, where this cottage stood, though pro- 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 377 

prietors of the lands they cultivate, sleep, and eat, and 
work for five months of the year in the lower storey of 
their houses, in company with their cattle, for the sake 
of the heat they give out I grieved to see the members 
of this noble Church, the descendants of heroic martyrs, 
suffering such hardships, steeped to the lips in poverty ; 
but how was my pity changed to astonishment and admi- 
ration ? In the poor, bare house where I stood, I found 
a library of not less than thirty books, great and small ; 
and among these, interesting to see and curious to tell, 
French translations of some of Ryle's tracts and Spur- 
geon's sermons. The Valdese, by this and many things 
else, reminded me of the old, poor but virtuous, intelli- 
gent, Bible-reading, Sabbath-keeping peasantry of Scot- 
land — many of whom still exist, and whose character in 
connection with the subject of their dwelHngs, I would 
make a digression to free from ignorant and unmerited 
aspersions. 

It has been fancied and asserted that where people 
live in such cottages as I have described, and found this 
woman dying in, the proprieties of life cannot possibly 
be maintained. Decency, it is said, must always be 
lost where a whole family live and sleep in one room. 
So many of our modem sanitarians and philanthropists 
allege ; to use the words of Paul, "understanding neither 
what they say, nor whereof they affirm." I venture, on 
the contrary, to affirm from personal observation that 
many of the old Scotch peasants who lived in such cir- 
cumstances would compare favourably in point of deli- 
cacy and decent habits with people in any rank of life. 



378 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 



or any country under the sun. Those who assume that 
it must have been otherwise, do so through their igno- 
rance of the arrangements that obtained in these cot- 
tages, and especially of the merits and mysteries of what 
are called box-beds. This was an old invention, which 
no doubt owed its existence to those feelings of delicacy 
it at once gratified and preserved. These beds, let me 
explain, were so screened all round with a wooden frame- 
work, that when the sliding-doors by which they were 
entered were closed, the party within was completely 
concealed. Each such bed in the single apartment 
where the family slept was thus in fact a room within 
the room, and as much shut out from observation as i/ 
it had been a separate chamber in another quarter ol 
the house. Being furnished within with shelves for 
clothes and other things, the persons inside these 
wooden walls could dress and undress with as delicate 
a regard to propriety as the Queen in her palace or a 
duchess in her dressing-room. And, since our poorer 
classes find it almost impossible to pay the rent de- 
manded, especially in the large towns, for two or three 
apartments, and therefore herd together in a way offen- 
sive to decency and destructive of virtue, it might be 
well worth considering whether this old fashion might 
not be introduced among them with advantage. A 
simple device, which I saw in use in Brittany, where 
such beds are common, removes the chief objection to 
which they stand exposed. In that part of France 
where the natives, who speak not the French but a 
Celtic tongue, have prescrrved unchanged for five hundred 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFOE.GIVEN, 379 

years, if not from the days of the Druids, the customs of 
their ancestors, you will see three or four such beds in 
one apartment. Made of beautiful walnut or cherry 
wood, polished like a mirror, and carved with consider- 
able taste, they are ornamental rather than otherwise; 
and having a breadth of five or six inches of open 
lattice-work at the top, they are constructed with an eye 
to fresh air as well as to those delicate proprieties of 
life, which, being germane to virtue and godliness. Sab- 
bath sermons and Sunday magazines do well to recom- 
mend. 

To return now to my story. It was in such a bed the 
woman whom I had been requested to visit lay a-dying. 
So soon as I entered the cottage her attendants hailed 
my appearance, expecting that she would now unburden 
her conscience, and get free to depart, and so drop the 
curtain on a scene that was one of pain to her, and 
terror to them. They hastened to announce my arrival. 
I heard her mutter something in reply, but could neither 
catch the words, nor see her face. There was no light 
but what, coming from the fire on the hearth, threw 
a feeble and ghastly glare over the room, and the forms 
and faces of her attendants; while, though its doors 
stood open, the pillow on which her head lay was cast 
into deep shadow by the fixed framework of the bed. 
Getting a candle lighted, I placed it on a shelf inside, 
where it shone full on the form and face of what looked 
much more like a dead than a living body. The counte- 
nance was singularly pallid ; the nose pinched sharp ; the 
eyes deeply sunk in their sockets ; the features firm and 



380 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

rigid ; and the brow, from which I put back some gre^ 
dishevelled locks, felt chill and clammy. The only sign 
of life was in the eyes, which, though partially glazed 
with a film, followed all ray movements; strangely, I 
may say horribly, mingling the features of life and death, 
giving to the body the appearance of an animated corpse. 
I did not wonder much, knowing the common super- 
stitions of the country, that those who watched her had 
got nervous, and possessed with the notion that some 
dreadful crime lay heavy on her conscience, which she 
must reveal ere the spirit was allowed to leave its mortal 
tabernacle. For a few moments I silently contemplated 
the solemn sight ; and on waking from my reverie, found 
the attendants standing close by my side. During those 
years which I spent so happily as a country minister, 
I was often annoyed on my visits to the dying by the 
neighbours, no doubt with the best intentions, pouring 
into the house — crowding the room. The practice was 
inconsiderate, depriving of fresh air one who was, per- 
haps, with heavy lift of chest and shoulders, gasping for 
breath. Besides, it altogether prevented or interfered 
with free and confidential intercourse — that intercourse 
which, though far removed from the secrets of a Romau 
Catholic confessional, often affords relief to the mind of 
the dying, and to the minister of the Gospel a precious 
opportunity of saving a soul, or soothing a troubled spirit. 
It might be that the female attendants here in crowding 
round the bed had no curiosity, but were merely follow- 
ing what, when the minister of a rural parish, I had 
found to be a very common custom. However, if there 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 38! 

was any ground for their suspicions, and some secret 
crime was to be revealed, it was more likely to be 
divulged to my ear alone than in their hearing. So 
T asked them to retire, which they did with some reluc- 
tance, taking seats by the fireside. Left alone, I now 
addressed myself to the dying woman ; and, approaching 
the matter with the utmost delicacy, was not long in 
finding that she had no murder or any such crime to 
disclose — a circumstance which, in justice to her, I let 
the nurses know. 

Yet death-beds that have revealed dreadful crimes 
have been less dreadful than hers. In all my experience 
as a minister, I never stood by one so appalling. I had 
seen people dying in many and very different frames of 
mind — some in callous indifference, others in eager 
anxiety crying, What shall I do to be saved? some 
despondent, others full of hope; not a few with their 
heads pillowed on Jesus' bosom, enjoying a calm and 
blissful peace; one or two, in an ecstacy, in celestial 
transports, rejoicing in the Lord and soaring away up to 
glory on the wings of song. Here, this woman was 
dying in **the blackness of darkness." Standing on 
the deck, I have seen a drowning man, to whom a life- 
buoy was thrown across the roaring waters, catch it in 
his arms, and I have seen a man on his death-bed seize 
with equal eagerness and cling with as strong a hold to 
the hope of a Saviour, of a free, full, gracious pardon 
through the blood of Christ. I made that offer to this 
dying woman, and, though hanging on the brink of a 
lost eternity, she rejected it — cast it from her. She was 



383 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

no sceptic ; had never read a line of Tom Paine or Vol- 
taire. Nor was her mind diseased, in the proper sense 
of the term. It is indeed hard to say how dying people 
may comport themselves when under delirium. I re- 
member the case of a sweet young girl in my country 
parish, from whose lips, quite unaccustomed to oaths or 
any improper language, there came rolling forth, as if 
she had been possessed of a devil, volleys of fearful im- 
precations. But no fever was disordering this woman's 
brain. She was coherent, calm, collected. So far as 
concerned her mental faculties, her sun was setting with- 
out a cloud. B.ut what a cloud otherwise rested on her 
troubled spirit ! She neither could nor would entertain 
a hope of salvation— putting away from her all my offers 
of a Saviour. I prayed for her ; I pleaded with her ; but 
only to get such answers as reminded me of the request 
of that evil spirit who implored our Lord to let him 
alone, nor " torment him before his time." Despair had 
her in his ruthless grasp ; and a darkness deeper than 
what was gathering around her bed, lay on her soul. 
Still, when I thought how long she had been a-dying, 
for how many days death had strangely lingered by the 
door, I hoped it might be for a gracious purpose i and 
that, called at the eleventh hour, her case might yet 
prove one where Christ saves at the uttermost. To me, 
as to His sen^ant of old, God might be saying, " Pray 
not for her." — " She is joined to her idols, let her alone." 
Yet I clung to the hope that death had delayed to strike, 
because, bending in pity over this wretched creature, 
God in heaven was saying, " How shall I give thee up, 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 383 

Ephraim ? how shall I deliver thee, Israel ? how shall 1 
make thee as Admah ? how shall I set thee as Zeboim ? 
Mine heart is turned within me, my repentings are kin- 
dled altogether. I will not execute the fierceness of 
mine anger . . . for I am God, and not man ! " So 
I hoped, continued to hope ; waiting, watching, as they 
that watch for the morning. But, alas ! there came no 
change. At parting, I took her cold hand in mine, and 
bent over her to ask, if she could cherish a hope ? But 
— as if the pains of the damned had already begun, her 
only answer was to gnash her teeth, and look up in my 
face with an expression of despair, which long haunted, 
and even still sometimes haunts me. She " died, and 
gave no sign." 

If my acquaintance with this unhappy woman had 
begun, as it ended, there, I might have regarded hers as 
a case where the repeated rejection of all His gracious 
offers has provoked God to withdraw His Spirit, and 
leave sinners, as He left Pharaoh, to the hardness of 
their own hearts. For though, thanks be to a loving 
and long-suffering God, these words hold generally 
trae, — 

As long as life its term extends, 
Hope's blest dominion never ends ; 
For while the lamp holds on to bum, 
The greatest siimer may return — 

cases occur from time to time to prove the extreme 
danger of continued impenitence and procrastination. 
Like the lurid clouds which thunder, and flash-out light- 
nings from the blessed sky, there are, mingled with the 



384 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

gracious words of Scripture, awful and ominous intima- 
tions — such as, " My Spirit sliall not always strive with 
man " — such as, " Your covenant with death shall be 
disannulled, and your agreement with hell shall not 
stand. . . . For the Lord shall rise up as in Mount 
Perazim, He shall be wroth as in the valley of Gibeon, 
that He may do His work, His strange work ; and bring 
to pass His act, His strange act. Now, therefore, be ye 
not mockers, lest your bands be made strong," — such as, 
"Because I have called, and ye refused; I have stretched 
out my hand, and no man regarded ; but ye have set at 
naught all my counsel, and would none of my reproof: 
I also will laugh at your calamity; I will mock when 
your fear cometh ; when your fear cometh as desolation, 
and your destruction cometh as a whirlwind ; when dis- 
tress and anguish cometh upon you." Let none there- 
fore venture to keep Christ waiting at the door — till he 
come who knocks, not to request, but to demand admit- 
tance. When that happens, no Saviour may be nigh, 
lingering there : nor when the soul, alarmed at the 
appearance of the King of Terrors, flies to the gate of 
mei'cy, may there be any other answer to its cry, Open 
and let me in, than this. The door is shut ! 

And who shut it in this case ? It was not God. I am 
sure of that. He has no pleasure in the death of him 
that dieth, but is willing rather that all should turn and 
live. Sin is suicidal ; and in this, as in every other 
instance, such as are barred out of heaven, have only 
themselves to blame. But the peculiarity of this case 
lay here, that, strange to say it, the means by which this 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 38$ 

woman destroyed herself, plunged her soul into perdi- 
tion, was her prayers — and that very prayer which, 
taught by Jesus to His disciples for a very different 
purpose, she had learned from a mother's lips, and in 
the days of sweet childhood had often lisped at a 
mother's knee. Like, I fear, not a few others, every 
time, in church or elsewhere, she had repeated the words, 
" Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that tres- 
pass against us," she had done worse than drive a nail 
into her coffin. Judging from that dreadful death-bed, 
God had taken her at her word. She had lived Unfor- 
giving, and died Unforgiven. 

Within the walls of that same cottage she and I had 
met in other years ; and standing on that same floor, I 
had warned as with a prophet's tongue, had solemnly and 
affectionately warned, her of the very scene that I had 
now the pain to witness. It so happened that, years 
before, I had been asked by her daughter, a highly 
respectable woman, and her only surviving child, to 
mediate between her and her mother. Domestic differ- 
ences about money matters, or something else, had grown 
and ripened into a bitter quarrel; and, after years of 
alienation, the daughter, who longed to be restored to a 
mother's affections, requested me to try if I could heal 
the breach. For this purpose I waited on the mother ; 
but to find all my efforts coldly, resolutely, and at length 
even fiercely repelled. As ever happens in such cases, 
there were faults on both sides. But the mother, not 
satisfied with admitting none on hers, bitterly exaggerated 
her daughter's faults, and even where her condijct 

c c 



386 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

admitted of a favourable, put none but an unfavourable and 
the worst construction on it. This shocked me. Still I 
did not abandon either hope or the attempt — having seen 
in other cases what a depth of affection is in a mother's 
heart, and how much more than anyone else a father or 
mother can forgive and forget. I attempted to mollify 
her — recalling the happy days when her daughter, a 
sweet infant, hung on her breast; lay nestled in her 
bosom; the joy of her heart and home, prattled at her 
knee. I reminded her of the long-suffering and love of 
God ; of Him who shed his blood for his enemies, and, 
dying, forgave his murderers. With everything that could 
touch her conscience and wake the mother in her heart, 
I plied her ; imploring her in the name of Christ : and 
by her hopes of salvation, to act a Christian part, and, 
pitying a daughter's sorrow, receive her back to her arms. 
Hard as the rock under whose shadow her cottage stood, 
she sat obdurate and unmoved. At length patience gave 
way; and yielding to what I felt to be a holy indig- 
nation, I rose to shake the dust from my feet, and warn 
her, since she refused to forgive, she need not hope to be 
forgiven in the hour of death and at the day of judgment. 
Now the hour had come when as she meted to others, it 
was meted to her again. Unforgiving, so far as man 
could judge, she was Unforgiven ; hers, the only death- 
bed I have seen, during a ministry of six and thirty years, 
of blank and black despair. On going out, I found the 
whole firmament sparkling with stars, and a broad band 
of silver light cast on the sea by the rising moon, like a 
path that led from the moaning shor^ tO distant, happier 



UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 385 

worlds. A contrast, indeed, to the scene I had left ! — a 
dying sinner around whose head a night had gathered 
without one ray of hope, and for whose depsutiDg 
spirit no bright way seemed to open to the gates cf 
heaven. 

Quarrels will arise between the dearest friends, and in 
the bosom of the most affectionate families. Would that 
the sun never went down on our wrath ! and instead of 
being allowed to form deep, running sores, that discharge 
offensive humours, and, even when closed, leave ugly 
scars behind, would that all such wounds were healed by 
what surgeons call the " first intention ! " But if this has 
not been done, let us beware of cherishing an unforgiving 
spirit. Of all states of mind, an implacable temper least 
becomes those who cannot themselves be saved but by a 
large measure of forgiveness, and is most unlike, and in- 
deed plainly opposed to, the mind that is in Jesus Christ. 
It is sad, and much worse than merely sad, to see love 
turned into hatred, or warm affection into cold indiffer- 
ence. Nursing an unforgiving temper, making no honest 
and anxious attempt at reconciliation, repelling perhaps 
the efforts mutual friends make to heal the breach, every 
time, in church or elsewhere, we repeat the words, *' For- 
give us our trespasses, as we forgive them that trespass 
against us," we are mocking God ; and pronouncing on 
ourselves the horrible imprecations, familiar to profane 
and brutal lips, with which I shall not shock my readers 
nor pollute these pages. Thankless as their office often 
proves, blessed are the peacemakers ! But of all peace- 
piakers, those are most blessed ^vho humble the pride of 



$88 UNFORGIVING AND UNFORGIVEN. 

their own hearts in the dust, and, though the injured, 
stoop as Jesus stooped, to make the first overtures of 
reconciliation. Would that the tale I have told might 
warn some ! — inducing them to take staff, or pen, in 
hand, to heal every unhappy quarrel with friend, or 
aeighbour, or member of their family ! Our Lord places 
such an effort at the head of all Christian duties. He 
^ives it honourable precedence over prayers, and preach- 
ing, and sacraments, and the highest religious services, 
[t is one a man should leave his pew in the church, 
should rise from the sacred table of communion, should 
get carried from his dying bed, to accomplish. " If," 
says our Lord, " thou bring thy gift to the altar, and there 
rememberest that thy brother hath ought against thee ; 
^eave there thy gift before the altar, and go thy way ; 
ftrst be reconciled to thy brother, and then come and 
offer thy gift. Agree with thine adversary quickly, whiles 
thou art in the way with him ; lest at any time the adver- 
S3.ry deliver thee to the judge, and the judge deliver thee 
to the officer, and thou be cast into prison. Verily I say 
unto thee, Thou shalt by no means come out thence, till 
thou hast paid the uttermost farthing." Be not de™ 
ceived ; God is not mocked : for whatsoever a man 
soweth, that; shall he also reap. Unforgiving, is to bf? 
Unforgivea 



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address an audience upon all sorts of occasions and have little time 
to look up the literature bearing upon the subject." 

Anniversary and Religious {A Companion 

Volume). Historical Outlines and Beautiful Thoughts, 
for the thirteen Timely Occasions of our Church year. 
F. Noble, D. D., Editor. 516 pp., i2mo, $1.75. 

"Public men, preachers, members of leagues, and associations, 
pupils in schools, everybody who has occasion to make an address, 
or write in recognition of any of our anniversaries, will be grateful 
for a work that supplies them with facts and fig^ures from the best 
sources relating to the day to be celebrated." — Christian Advocate. 

The Bench and Bar, as Makers of the 

American Republic. A Forefathers' Day Address, cele- 
brating the 280th anniversary of the landing of the 
Pilgrims. By Hon. W. W. Goodrich, Presiding Jus- 
tice Supreme Court, Appellate Division, State of New 
York. 66 pages. With portraits. Boards, 50 cents. 

E. B. TREAT & CO., Publishers, New York, 






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